The Republic of Plato

THE

REPUBLIC OF PLATO

JOWETT

HENRY FROWDE

OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE
AMEN CORNER, E.C.

THE

REPUBLIC OF PLATO

TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH
WITH

INTRODUCTION, ANALYSIS
MARGINAL ANALYSIS, AND INDEX

BY

B. JOWETT, M.A.

MASTER OF BALL1OL COLLEGE

REGIUS PROFESSOR OF GREEK IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
DOCTOR IN THEOLOGY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF LEYDEN

THE THIRD EDITION
REVISED AND CORRECTED THROUGHOUT

Ojtfori

AT THE CLARENDON PRESS

M DCCC LXXXVIII

[A!/ rights reserved}

TO MY FORMER PUPILS

IN BALLIOL COLLEGE

AND IN THE UNIVERSlfY OF OXFORD,

WHO DURING FORTY-SIX YEARS

HAVE BEEN THE BEST OF FRIENDS TO ME,

tHIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED,

IN GRATEFUL RECOGNITION
OF THEIR NEVER FAILING ATTACHMENT.

PREFACE.

IN publishing a third edition of the Republic of Plato
(originally included in my edition of Plato's works), I have
to acknowledge the assistance of several friends, especially
of my secretary, Mr. Matthew Knight, now residing for his
health at Davos, and of Mr. Frank Fletcher, Exhibitioner
of Balliol College. To their accuracy and scholarship I am
under great obligations. The excellent index, in which
are contained references to the other dialogues as well as
to the Republic, is entirely the work of Mr. Knight. I am
also considerably indebted to Mr. J. W. Mackail, Fellow
of Balliol College, who read over the whole book in the
previous edition, and noted several inaccuracies.

The additions and alterations both in the introduction
and in the text, affect at least a third of the work.

Having regard to the extent of these alterations, and to
the annoyance which is felt by the owner of a book at the
possession of it in an inferior form, and still more keenly
by the writer himself, who must always desire to be read as
he is at his best, I have thought that some persons might
like to exchange for the new edition the separate edition
of the Republic published in 1881, to which this present
volume is the successor. I have therefore arranged that
those who desire to make this exchange, on depositing a
perfect copy of the former separate edition with any agent
of the Clarendon Press, shall be entitled to receive the new
edition at half-price.

It is my hope to issue a revised edition of the remaining
Dialogues in the course of a year.

INTRODUCTION AND ANALYSIS.

THE Republic of Plato is the longest of his works with the Republic.
exception of the Laws, and is certainly the greatest of them.
There are nearer approaches to modern metaphysics in the
Philebus and in the Sophist ; the Politicus or Statesman is more
ideal ; the form and institutions of the State are more clearly
drawn out in the Laws ; as works of art, the Symposium and the
Protagoras are of higher excellence. But no other Dialogue of
Plato has the same largeness of view and the same perfection of
style ; no other shows an equal knowledge of the world, or con-
tains more of those thoughts which are new as well as old, and
not of one age only but of all. Nowhere in Plato is there a
deeper irony or a greater wealth of humour or imagery, or more
dramatic power. Nor in any other of his writings is the attempt
made to interweave life and speculation, or to connect politics
with philosophy. The Republic is the centre around which the
other Dialogues may be grouped ; here philosophy reaches the
highest point (cp. especially in Books V, VI, VII) to which ancient
thinkers ever attained. Plato among the Greeks, like Bacon
among the moderns, was the first who conceived a method of
knowledge, although neither of them always distinguished the
bare outline or form from the substance of truth ; and both of
them had to be content with an abstraction of science which was
not yet realized. He was the greatest metaphysical genius whom
the world has seen ; and in him, more than in any other ancient
thinker, the germs of future knowledge are contained. The
sciences of logic and psychology, which have supplied so many
instruments of thought to after-ages, are based upon the analyses
of Socrates and Plato. The principles of definition, the law of
contradiction, the fallacy of arguing in a circle, the distinction
between the essence and accidents of a thing or notion, between
means and ends, between causes and conditions ; also the division
of the mind into the rational, concupiscent, and irascible elements,
or of pleasures and desires into necessary and unnecessary — these

b

ii The greatness of Plato.

Republic, and other great forms of thought are all of them to be found in the
Republic, and were probably first invented by Plato. The greatest
of all logical truths, and the one of which writers on philosophy
are most apt to lose sight, the difference between words and things,
has been most strenuously insisted on by him (cp. Rep. 454 A ;
Polit. 261 E; Cratyl. 435, 436 if.), although he has not always
avoided the confusion of them in his own writings (e.g. Rep.
463 E). But he does not bind up truth in logical formulae, —
logic is still veiled in metaphysics ; and the science which he
imagines to ' contemplate all truth and all existence ' is very
unlike the doctrine of the syllogism which Aristotle claims to
have discovered (Soph. Elenchi, 33. 18).

Neither must we forget that the Republic is but the third part
of a still larger design which was to have included an ideal history
of Athens, as well as a political and physical philosophy. The
fragment of the Critias has given birth to a world-famous fiction,
second only in importance to the tale of Troy and the legend of
Arthur ; and is said as a fact to have inspired some of the early
navigators of the sixteenth century. This mythical tale, of
which the subject was a history of the wars of the Athenians
against the island of Atlantis, is supposed to be founded upon
an unfinished poem of Solon, to which it would have stood
in the same relation as the writings of the logographers to the
poems of Homer. It would have told of a struggle for Liberty
(cp. Tim. 25 C), intended to represent the conflict of Persia and
Hellas. We may judge from the noble commencement of the
Timaeus, from the fragment of the Critias itself, and from the third
book of the Laws, in what manner Plato would have treated
this high argument. We can only guess why the great design
was abandoned ; perhaps because Plato became sensible of some
incongruity in a fictitious history, or because he had lost his
interest in it, or because advancing years forbade the completion
of it ; and we may please ourselves with the fancy that had this
imaginary narrative ever been finished, we should have found
Plato himself sympathising with the struggle for Hellenic in-
dependence (cp. Laws, iii. 698 ff.), singing a hymn of triumph
over Marathon and Salamis, perhaps making the reflection of
Herodotus (v. 78) where he contemplates the growth of the
Athenian empire — 'How brave a thing is freedom of speech,

The greatness of Plato. in

which has made the Athenians so far exceed every other state of Republic.
Hellas in greatness !' or, more probably, attributing the victory to
the ancient good order of Athens and to the favour of Apollo and
Athene (cp. Introd. to Critias).

Again, Plato may be regarded as the 'captain' (dpxwos) or
leader of a goodly band of followers ; for in the Republic is to be
found the original of Cicero's De Republica, of St. Augustine's City
of God, of the Utopia of Sir Thomas More, and of the numerous
other imaginary States which are framed upon the same model.
The extent to which Aristotle or the Aristotelian school were
indebted to him in the Politics has been little recognised, and
the recognition is the more necessary because it is not made by
Aristotle himself. The two philosophers had more in common than
they were conscious of; and probably some elements of Plato
remain still undetected in Aristotle. In English philosophy too,
many affinities may be traced, not only in the works of the Cam-
bridge Platonists, but in great original writers like Berkeley or
Coleridge, to Plato and his ideas. That there is a truth higher than
experience, of which the mind bears witness to herself, is a conviction
which in our own generation has been enthusiastically asserted, and
is perhaps gaining ground. Of the Greek authors who at the
Renaissance brought a new life into the world Plato has had the
greatest influence. The Republic of Plato is also the first treatise
upon education, of which the writings of Milton and Locke,
Rousseau, Jean Paul, and Goethe are the legitimate descendants.
Like Dante or Bunyan, he has a revelation of another life ; like
Bacon, he is profoundly impressed with the unity of knowledge ;
in the early Church he exercised a real influence on theology,
and at the Revival of Literature on politics. Even the fragments
of his words when ' repeated at second-hand ' (Symp. 215 D) have
in all ages ravished the hearts of men, who have seen reflected
in them their own higher nature. He is the father of idealism in
philosophy, in politics, in literature. And many of the latest
conceptions of modern thinkers and statesmen, such as the unity
of knowledge, the reign of law, and the equality of the sexes,
have been anticipated in a dream by him.

The argument of the Republic is the search after Justice, the
nature of which is first hinted at by Cephalus, the just and blame-

iv The argument of the Republic.

Republic, less old man — then discussed on the basis of proverbial morality
by Socrates and Polemarchus — then caricatured by Thrasymachus
and partially explained by Socrates — reduced to an abstraction by
Glaucon and Adeimantus, and having become invisible in the
individual reappears at length in the ideal State which is con-
structed by Socrates. The first care of the rulers is to be educa-
tion, of which an outline is drawn after the old Hellenic model,
providing only for an improved religion and morality, and more
simplicity in music and gymnastic, a manlier strain of poetry, and
greater harmony of the individual and the State. We are thus
led on to the conception of a higher State, in which ' no man calls
anything his own,' and in which there is neither 'marrying nor
giving in marriage,' and 'kings are philosophers' and 'philoso-
phers are kings ; ' and there is another and higher education, in-
tellectual as well as moral and religious, of science as well as of
art, and not of youth only but of the whole of life. Such a State
is hardly to be realized in this world and quickly degenerates.
To the perfect ideal succeeds the government of the soldier and
the lover of honour, this again declining into democracy, and de-
mocracy into tyranny, in an imaginary but regular order having
not much resemblance to the actual facts. When ' the wheel has
come full circle' we do not begin again with a new period of
human life ; but we have passed from the best to the worst, and
there we end. The subject is then changed and the old quarrel of
poetry and philosophy which had been more lightly treated in
the earlier books of the Republic is now resumed and fought out
to a conclusion. Poetry is discovered to be an imitation thrice
removed from the truth, and Homer, as well as the dramatic
poets, having been condemned as an imitator, is sent into banish-
ment along with them. And the idea of the State is supplemented
by the revelation of a future life.

The division into books, like all similar divisions \ is probably
later than the age of Plato. The natural divisions are five in
number ;— (i) Book I and the first half of Book II down to p. 368,
which is introductory ; the first book containing a refutation of the
popular and sophistical notions of justice, and concluding, like
some of the earlier Dialogues, without arriving at any definite
result. To this is appended a restatement of the nature of justice
1 Cp. Sir G. C. Lewis in the Classical Museum, vol. ii. p. i.

The divisions. v

according to common opinion, and an answer is demanded to the Republic.
question — What is justice, stripped of appearances ? The second
division (2) includes the remainder of the second and the whole of
the third and fourth books, which are mainly occupied with the
construction of the first State and the first education. The third
division (3) consists of the fifth, sixth, and seventh books, in which
philosophy rather than justice is the subject of enquiry, and the
second State is constructed on principles of communism and ruled
by philosophers, and the contemplation of the idea of good takes
the place of the social and political virtues. In the eighth and
ninth books (4) the perversions of States and of the individuals who
correspond to them are reviewed in succession ; and the nature of
pleasure and the principle of tyranny are further analysed in the
individual man. The tenth book (5) is the conclusion of the
whole, in which the relations of philosophy to poetry are finally
determined, and the happiness of the citizens in this life, which has
now been assured, is crowned by the vision of another.

Or a more general division into two parts may be adopted ; the
first (Books I-IV) containing the description of a State framed
generally in accordance with Hellenic notions of religion and
morality, while in the second (Books V-X) the Hellenic State is
transformed into an ideal kingdom of philosophy, of which all
other governments are the perversions. These two points of view
are really opposed, and the opposition is only veiled by the genius
of Plato. The Republic, like the Phaedrus (see Introduction to
Phaedrus), is an imperfect whole ; the higher light of philosophy
breaks through the regularity of the Hellenic temple, which at last
fades away into the heavens (592 B). Whether this imperfection of
structure arises from an enlargement of the plan ; or from the im-
perfect reconcilement in the writer's own mind of the struggling
elements of thought which are now first brought together by
him ; or, perhaps, from the composition of the work at different
times — are questions, like the similar question about the Iliad
and the Odyssey, which are worth asking, but which cannot have
a distinct answer. In the age of Plato there was no regular mode
of publication, and an author would have the less scruple in
altering or adding to a work which was known only to a few of
his friends. There is no absurdity in supposing that he may have
laid his labours aside for a time, or turned from one work to

vi The second title.

Republic, another ; and such interruptions would be more likely to occur
m tne case °f a long tnan °f a short writing. In all attempts to
determine the chronological order of the Platonic writings on
internal evidence, this uncertainty about any single Dialogue being
composed at one time is a disturbing element, which must be
admitted to affect longer works, such as the Republic and the
Laws, more than shorter ones. But, on the other hand, the
seeming discrepancies of the Republic may only arise out of the
discordant elements which the philosopher has attempted to unite
in a single whole, perhaps without being himself able to recognise
the inconsistency which is obvious to us. For there is a judgment
of after ages which few great writers have ever been able to
anticipate for themselves. They do not perceive the want of
connexion in their own writings, or the gaps in their systems
which are visible enough to those who come after them. In the
beginnings of literature and philosophy, amid the first efforts of
thought and language, more inconsistencies occur than now, when
the paths of speculation are well worn and the meaning of words
precisely defined. For consistency, too, is the growth of time ;
and some of the greatest creations of the human mind have been
wanting in unity. Tried by this test, several of the Platonic
Dialogues, according to our modern ideas, appear to be defective,
but the deficiency is no proof that they were composed at different
times or by different hands. And the supposition that the Re-
public was written uninterruptedly and by a continuous effort is
in some degree confirmed by the numerous references from one
part of the work to another.

The second title, ' Concerning Justice,' is not the one by which
the Republic is quoted, either by Aristotle or generally in antiquity,
and, like the other second titles of the Platonic Dialogues, may
therefore be assumed to be of later date. Morgenstern and others
have asked whether the definition of justice, which is the professed
aim, or the construction of the State is the principal argument of
the work. The answer is, that the two blend in one, and are two
faces of the same truth ; for justice is the order of the State, and
the State is the visible embodiment of justice under the conditions
of human society. The one is the soul and the other is the body,
and the Greek ideal of the State, as of the individual, is a fair mind
in a fair body. In Hegelian phraseology the state is the reality of

Is there one argument or more ? vii

which justice is the idea. Or, described in Christian language, the Republic.
kingdom of God is within, and yet developes into a Church or ex- IN™°N.LC
ternal kingdom ; ' the house not made with hands, eternal in the
heavens,' is reduced to the proportions of an earthly building. Or,
to use a Platonic image, justice and the State are- the warp and the
woof which run through the whole texture. And when the con-
stitution of the State is completed, the conception of justice is not
dismissed, but reappears under the same or different names
throughout the work, both as the inner law of the individual soul,
and finally as the principle of rewards and punishments in another
life. The virtues are based on justice, of which common honesty
in buying and selling is the shadow, and justice is based on the
idea of good, which is the harmony of the world, and is reflected
both in the institutions of states and in motions of the heavenly
bodies (cp. Tim. 47). The Timaeus, which takes up the political
rather than the ethical side of the Republic, and is chiefly occu-
pied with hypotheses concerning the outward world, yet contains
many indications that the same law is supposed to reign over the
State, over nature, and over man.

Too much, however, has been made of this question both in
ancient and modern times. There is a stage of criticism in which
all works, whether of nature or of art, are referred to design.
Now in ancient writings, and indeed in literature generally, there
remains often a large element which was not comprehended in the
original design. For the plan grows under the author's hand ;
new thoughts occur to him in the act of writing ; he has not
worked out the argument to the end before he begins. The reader
who seeks to find some one idea under which the whole may be
conceived, must necessarily seize on the vaguest and most general.
Thus Stallbaum, who is dissatisfied with the ordinary explanations
of the argument of the Republic, imagines himself to have found
the true argument ' in the representation of human life in a State
perfected by justice, and governed according to the idea of good.'
There may be some use in such general descriptions, but they can
hardly be said to express the design of the writer. The truth is,
that we may as well speak of many designs as of one ; nor need
anything be excluded from the plan of a great work to which the
mind is naturally led by the association of ideas, and which does
not interfere with the general purpose. What kind or degree of

viii The leading thoughts.

Republic, unity is to be sought after in a building, in the plastic arts, in
N™ON!UC" poetry, in prose, is a problem which has to be determined rela-
tively \p the subject-matter. To Plato himself, the enquiry ' what
was the intention of the writer,' or ' what was the principal argu-
ment of the Republic ' would have been hardly intelligible, and
therefore had better be at once dismissed (cp. the Introduction to
the Phaedrus, vol. i.).

Is not the Republic the vehicle of three or four great truths which,
to Plato's own mind, are most naturally represented in the form of
the State ? Just as in the Jewish prophets the reign of Messiah, or
* the day of the Lord,' or the suffering Servant or people of God, or
the ' Sun of righteousness with healing in his wings ' only convey,
to us at least, their great spiritual ideals, so through the Greek State
Plato reveals to us his own thoughts about divine perfection, which
is the idea of good — like the sun in the visible world ; — about human
perfection, which is justice — about education beginning in youth
and continuing in later years — about poets and sophists and tyrants
who are the false teachers and evil rulers of mankind — about * the
world ' which is the embodiment of them — about a kingdom which
exists nowhere upon earth but is laid up in heaven to be the
pattern and rule of human life. No such inspired creation is at
unity with itself, any more than the clouds of heaven when the sun
pierces through them. Every shade of light and dark, of truth, and
of fiction which is the veil of truth, is allowable in a work of philo-
sophical imagination. It is not all on the same plane ; it easily
passes from ideas to myths and fancies, from facts to figures of
speech. It is not prose but poetry, at least a great part of it, and
ought not to be judged by the rules of logic or the probabilities
of history. The writer is not fashioning his ideas into an artistic
whole ; they take possession of him and are too much for him.
We have no need therefore to discuss whether a State such as
Plato has conceived is practicable or not, or whether the outward
form or the inward life came first into the mind of the writer. For
the practicability of his ideas has nothing to do with their truth
(v. 472 D) ; and the highest thoughts to which he attains may be
truly said to bear the greatest ' marks of design '—justice more
than the external frame-work of the State, the idea of good more
than justice. The great science of dialectic or the organisation of
ideas has no real content ; but is only a type of the method or

The imaginary date. ix

spirit in which the higher knowledge is to be pursued by the Republic.
spectator of all time and all existence. It is in the fifth, sixth, and IN™°£UC'
seventh books that Plato reaches the * summit of speculation,' and
these, although they fail to satisfy the requirements of a modern
thinker, may therefore be regarded as the most important, as they
are also the most original, portions of the work.

It is not necessary to discuss at length a minor question which
has been raised by Boeckh, respecting the imaginary date at which
the conversation was held (the year 411 B.C. which is proposed by
him will do as well as any other) ; for a writer of fiction, and
especially a writer who, like Plato, is notoriously careless of
chronology (cp. Rep. i. 336, Symp. 193 A, etc.), only aims at general
probability. Whether all the persons mentioned in the Republic
could ever have met at any one time is not a difficulty which
would have occurred to an Athenian reading the work forty years
later, or to Plato himself at the time of writing (any more than to
Shakespeare respecting one of his own dramas) ; and need not
greatly trouhjle us now. Yet this may be a question having no
answer * which is still worth asking,5 because the investigation shows
that we cannot argue historically from the dates in Plato ; it would be
useless therefore to waste time in inventing far-fetched reconcile-
ments of them in order to avoid chronological difficulties, such, for
example, as the conjecture of C. F. Hermann, that Glaucon and
Adeimantus are not the brothers but the uncles of Plato (cp. Apol.
34 A), or the fancy of Stallbaum that Plato intentionally left ana-
chronisms indicating the dates at • which some of his Dialogues
were written.

The principal characters in the Republic are Cephalus, Pole-
marchus, Thrasymachus, Socrates, Glaucon, and Adeimantus.
Cephalus appears in the introduction only, Polemarchus drops at
the end of the first argument, and Thrasymachus is reduced to
silence at the close of the first book. The main discussion is
carried on by Socrates, Glaucon, and Adeimantus. Among the
company are Lysias (the orator) and Euthydemus, the sons of
Cephalus and brothers of Polemarchus, an unknown Charmantides
— these are mute auditors ; also there is Cleitophon, who once
interrupts (340 A), where, as in the Dialogue which bears his
name, he appears as the friend and ally of Thrasymachus.

K The characters : Cephalus and Polemarchus :

Republic. Cephalus, the patriarch of the house, has been appropriately
IN™ON UC~ engaged in offering a sacrifice. He is the pattern of an old man
who has almost done with life, and is at peace with himself and
with all mankind. He feels that he is drawing nearer to the
world below, and seems to linger around the memory of the past.
He is eager that Socrates should come to visit him, fond of the
poetry of the last generation, happy in the consciousness of a
well-spent life, glad at having escaped from the tyranny of youth-
ful lusts. His love of conversation, his affection, his indifference
to riches, even his garrulity, are interesting traits of character.
He is not one of those who have nothing to say, because their
whole mind has been absorbed in making money. Yet he acknow-
ledges that riches have the advantage of placing men above the
temptation to dishonesty or falsehood. The respectful attention
shown to him by Socrates, whose love of conversation, no less
than the mission imposed upon him by the Oracle, leads him to
ask questions of all men, young and old alike (cp., i. 328 A), should
also be noted. Who better suited to raise the question of justice
than Cephalus, whose life might seem to be the expression of
it ? The moderation with which old age is pictured by Cephalus
as a very tolerable portion of existence is characteristic, not only
of him, but of Greek feeling generally, and contrasts with the
exaggeration of Cicero in the De Senectute. The evening of
life is described by Plato in the most expressive manner, yet
with the fewest possible touches. As Cicero remarks (Ep. ad
Attic, iv. 16), the aged Cephalus would have been out of place in
the discussion which follows, and which he could neither have
understood nor taken part in without a violation of dramatic
propriety (cp. Lysimachus in the Laches, 89).

His 'son and heir' Polemarchus has the frankness and im-
petuousness of youth ; he is for detaining Socrates by force in the
opening scene, and will not ' let him off' (v. 449 B) on the subject of
women and children. Like Cephalus, he is limited in his point of
view, and represents the proverbial stage of morality which has
rules of life rather than principles ; and he quotes Simonides (cp.
Aristoph. Clouds, 1355 ff.) as his father had quoted Pindar. But after
this he has no more to say; the answers which he makes are
only elicited from him by the dialectic of Socrates. He has not
yet experienced the influence of the Sophists like Glaucon and

Thrasymachus : xi

Adeimantus, nor is he sensible of the necessity of refuting them ; he Republic.
belongs to the pre-Socratic or pre-dialectical age. He is incapable
of arguing, and is bewildered by Socrates to such a degree that he
does not know what he is saying. He is made to admit that
justice is a thief, and that the virtues follow the analogy of the arts
(i. 333 E). From his brother Lysias (contra Eratosth. p. 121) we
learn that he fell a victim to the Thirty Tyrants, but no allusion is
here made to his fate, nor to the circumstance that Cephalus and
his family were of Syracusan origin, and had migrated from
Thurii to Athens.

The ' Chalcedonian giant,' Thrasymachus, of whom we have
already heard in the Phaedrus (267 D), is the personification of
the Sophists, according to Plato's conception of them, in some of
their worst characteristics. He is vain and blustering, refusing to
discourse unless he is paid, fond of making an oration, and hoping
thereby to escape the inevitable Socrates; but a mere child in
argument, and unable to foresee that the next 'move' (to use a
Platonic expression) will ' shut him up ' (vi. 487 B). He has reached
the stage of framing general notions, and in this respect is in
advance of Cephalus and Polemarchus. But he is incapable of
defending them in a discussion, and vainly tries to cover his con-
fusion with banter and insolence. Whether such doctrines as are
attributed to him by Plato were really held either by him or by
any other Sophist is uncertain ; in the infancy of philosophy
serious errors about morality might easily grow up— they are
certainly put into the mouths of speakers in Thucydides ; but we
are concerned at present with Plato's description of him, and not
with the historical reality. The inequality of the contest adds
greatly to the humour of the scene. The pompous and empty
Sophist is utterly helpless in the hands of the great master of
dialectic, who knows how to touch all the springs of vanity and
weakness in him. He is greatly irritated by the irony of Socrates,
but his noisy and imbecile rage only lays him more and more
open to the thrusts of his assailant. His determination to cram
down their throats, or put ' bodily into their souls ' his own words,
elicits a cry of horror from Socrates. The state of his temper
is quite as worthy of remark as the process of the argument.
Nothing is more amusing than his complete submission when he
has been once thoroughly beaten. At first he seems to continue

xii Glaucon and Adeimantus.

Republic, the discussion with reluctance, but soon with apparent good-will,
and he even testifies his interest at a later stage by one or two
occasional remarks (v. 450 A, B). When attacked by Glaucon
(vi. 498 C, D) he is humorously protected by Socrates * as one who
has never been his enemy and is now his friend.' From Cicero
and Quintilian and from Aristotle's Rhetoric (iii. i. 7 ; ii. 23. 29) we
learn that the Sophist whom Plato has made so ridiculous was a
man of note whose writings were preserved in later ages. The
play on his name which was made by his contemporary Herodicus
(Aris. Rhet. ii. 23, 29), ' thou wast ever bold in battle/ seems to
show that the description of him is not devoid of verisimilitude.

When Thrasymachus has been silenced, the two principal re-
spondents, Glaucon and Adeimantus, appear on the scene : here,
as in Greek tragedy (cp. Introd. to Phaedo), three actors are in-
troduced. At first sight the two sons of Ariston may seem to
wear a family likeness, like the two friends Simmias and Cebes in
the Phaedo. But on a nearer examination of them the similarity
vanishes, and they are seen to be distinct characters. Glaucon is
the impetuous youth who can 'just never have enough of fechting'
(cp. the character of him in Xen. Mem. iii. 6) ; the man of pleasure
who is acquainted with the mysteries of love (v. 474 D) ; the
'juvenis qui gaudet canibus,' and who improves the breed of
animals (v. 459 A) ; the lover of art and music (iii. 398 D, E) who
has all the experiences of youthful life. He is full of quickness
and penetration, piercing easily below the clumsy platitudes of
Thrasymachus to the real difficulty; he turns out to the light the
seamy side of human life, and yet does not lose faith in the just
and true. It is Glaucon who seizes what may be termed the
ludicrous relation of the philosopher to the world, to whom a state
of simplicity is ' a city of pigs,' who is always prepared with a jest
(iii. 398 C, 407 A ; v. 450, 451, 468 C ; vi. 509 C ; ix. 586) when the
argument offers him an opportunity, and who is ever ready to
second the humour of Socrates and to appreciate the ridiculous,
whether in the connoisseurs of music (vii. 531 A), or in the lovers
of theatricals (v. 475 D), or in the fantastic behaviour of the citizens
of democracy (viii. 557 foil.). His weaknesses are several times
alluded to by Socrates (iii. 402 E ; v. 474 D, 475 E), who, however,
will not allow him to be attacked by his brother Adeimantus
(viii. 548 D, E). He is a soldier, and, like Adeimantus, has been

The difference between them. xiii

distinguished at the battle of Megara (368 A, anno 456 ?). . . The Republic.
character of Adeimantus is deeper and graver, and the profounder
objections are commonly put into his mouth. Glaucon is more
demonstrative, and generally opens the game ; Adeimantus pur-
sues the argument further. Glaucon has more of the liveliness
and quick sympathy of youth ; Adeimantus has the maturer judg-
ment of a grown-up man of the world. In the second book, when
Glaucon insists that justice and injustice shall be considered with-
out regard to their consequences, Adeimantus remarks that they
are regarded by mankind in general only for the sake of their
consequences ; and in a similar vein of reflection he urges at the
beginning of the fourth book that Socrates fails in making his
citizens happy, and is answered that happiness is not the first but
the second thing, not the direct aim but the indirect consequence
of the good government of a State. In the discussion about re-
ligion and mythology, Adeimantus is the respondent (iii. 376-398),
but at p. 398 C, Glaucon breaks in with a slight jest, and carries on
the conversation in a lighter tone about music and gymnastic to
the end of the book. It is Adeimantus again who volunteers the
criticism of common sense on the Socratic method of argument
(vi. 487 B), and who refuses to let Socrates pass lightly over the ques-
tion of women and children (v. 449). It is Adeimantus who is the re-
spondent in the more argumentative, as Glaucon in the lighter and
more imaginative portions of the Dialogue. For example, through-
out the greater part of the sixth book, the causes of the corruption
of philosophy and the conception of the idea of good are discussed
with Adeimantus. At p. 506 C, Glaucon resumes his place of
principal respondent ; but he has a difficulty in apprehending the
higher education of Socrates, and makes some false hits in the
course of the discussion (526 D, 527 D). Once more Adeimantus
returns (viii. 548) with the allusion to his brother Glaucon whom he
compares to the contentious State ; in the next book (ix. 576) he is
again superseded, and Glaucon continues to the end (x. 621 B).

Thus in a succession of characters Plato represents the succes-
sive stages of morality, beginning with the Athenian gentleman of
the olden time, who is followed by the practical man of that day
regulating his life by proverbs and saws; to him succeeds the
wild generalization of the Sophists, and lastly come the young
disciples of the great teacher, who know the sophistical arguments

xiv The real and the Platonic Socrates.

Republic, but will not be convinced by them, and desire to go deeper into
~ the nature of things. These too, like Cephalus, Polemarchus,
Thrasymachus, are clearly distinguished from one another.
Neither in the Republic, nor in any other Dialogue of Plato, is
a single character repeated.

The delineation of Socrates in the Republic is not wholly con-
sistent. In the first book we have more of the real Socrates, such
as he is depicted in the Memorabilia of Xenophon, in the earliest
Dialogues of Plato, and in the Apology. He is ironical, provoking,
questioning, the old enemy of the Sophists, ready to put on the
mask of Silenus as well as to argue seriously. But in the sixth
book his enmity towards the Sophists abates ; he acknowledges
that they are the representatives rather than the corrupters of the
world (vi. 492 A). He also becomes more dogmatic and construc-
tive, passing beyond the range either of the political or the specu-
lative ideas of the real Socrates. In one passage (vi. 506 C) Plato
himself seems to intimate that the time had now come for Socrates,
who had passed his whole life in philosophy, to give his own
opinion and not to be always repeating the notions of other men.
There is no evidence that either the idea of good or the conception
of a perfect state were comprehended in the Socratic teaching,
though he certainly dwelt on the nature of the universal and of
final causes (cp. Xen. Mem. i. 4 ; Phaedo 97) ; and a deep thinker
like him, in his thirty or forty years of public teaching, could
hardly have failed to touch on the nature of family relations, for
which there is also some positive evidence in the Memorabilia
(Mem. i. 2, 51 foil.). The Socratic method is nominally retained ;
and every inference is either put into the mouth of the respondent
or represented as the common discovery of him and Socrates.
But any one can see that this is a mere form, of which the affec-
tation grows wearisome as the work advances. The method of
enquiry has passed into a method of teaching in which by the help
of interlocutors the same thesis is looked at from various points of
view. The nature of the process is truly characterized by Glaucon,
when he describes himself as a companion who is not good for
much in an investigation, but can see what he is shown (iv. 432 C),
and may, perhaps, give the answer to a question more fluently
than another (v. 474 A ; cp. 389 A).

Neither can we be absolutely certain that Socrates himself

Socrates. xv

taught the immortality of the soul, which is unknown to his disciple Republic.
Glaucon in the Republic (x. 608 D ; cp. vi. 498 D, E ; Apol. 40, 41) ; IN™O°£UC-
nor is there any reason to suppose that he used myths or reve-
lations of another world as a vehicle of instruction, or that he
would have banished poetry or have denounced the Greek
mythology. His favourite oath is retained, and a slight mention is
made of the daemonium, or internal sign, which is alluded to by
Socrates as a phenomenon peculiar to himself (vi. 496 C). A real
element of Socratic teaching, which is more prominent in the
Republic than in any of the other Dialogues of Plato, is the use of
example and illustration (ra $opriKa avrcS irpoo-fyepovTfs, iv. 442 E) :
* Let us apply the test of common instances.' ' You,' says Adei-
mantus, ironically, in the sixth book, 'are so unaccustomed to
speak in images.' And this use of examples or images, though
truly Socratic in origin, is enlarged by the genius of Plato into the
form of an allegory or parable, which embodies in the concrete
what has been already described, or is about to be described, in
the abstract. Thus the figure of the cave in Book VII is a re-
capitulation of the divisions of knowledge in Book VI. The
composite animal in Book IX is an allegory of the parts of the
soul. The noble captain and the ship and the true pilot in Book VI
are a figure of the relation of the people to the philosophers in the
State which has been described. Other figures, such as the dog
(ii. 375 A, D ; iii. 404 A, 416 A ; v. 451 D), or the marriage of the
portionless maiden (vi. 495, 496), or the drones and wasps in the
eighth and ninth books, also form links of connexion in long
passages, or are used to recall previous discussions.

Plato is most true to the character of his master when he
describes him as ' not of this world.' And with this representation
of him the ideal state and the other paradoxes of the Republic are
quite in accordance, though they cannot be shown to have been
speculations of Socrates. To him, as to other great teachers both
philosophical and religious, when they looked upward, the world
seemed to be the embodiment of error and evil. The common sense
of mankind has revolted against this view, or has only partially ad-
mitted it. And even in Socrates himself the sterner judgement
of the multitude at times passes into a sort of ironical pity or love.
Men in general are incapable of philosophy, and are therefore at
enmity with the philosopher ; but their misunderstanding of him

xvi Analysis 327.

Republic, is unavoidable (vi. 494 foil. ; ix. 589 D) : for they have never seen
lNr1oN.UC" mm as ne truly i§ m ms own image; they are only acquainted
with artificial systems possessing no native force of truth — words
which admit of many applications. Their leaders have nothing to
measure with, and are therefore ignorant of their own stature.
But they are to be pitied or laughed at, not to be quarrelled with ;
they mean well with their nostrums, if they could only learn that
they are cutting off a Hydra's head (iv. 426 D, E). This modera-
tion towards those who are in error is one of the most charac-
teristic features of Socrates in the Republic (vi. 499-502). In all
the different representations of Socrates, whether of Xenophon or
Plato, and amid the differences of the earlier or later Dialogues,
he always retains the character of the unwearied and disinterested
seeker after truth, without which he would have ceased to be
Socrates.

Leaving the characters we may now analyse the contents of the
Republic, and then proceed to consider (i) The .general aspects of
this Hellenic ideal of the State, (2) The modern lights in which the
thoughts of Plato may be read.

ANALYSIS. BOOK I. The Republic opens with a truly Greek scene— a
festival in honour of the goddess Bendis which is held in the
Piraeus ; to this is added the promise of an equestrian torch-race
in the evening. The whole work is supposed to be recited by
Socrates on the day after the festival to a small party, consisting of
Critias, Timaeus, Hermocrates, and another ; this we learn from
the first words of the Timaeus.

When the rhetorical advantage of reciting the Dialogue has been
gained, the attention is not distracted by any reference to the au-
dience ; nor is the reader further reminded of the extraordinary
length of the narrative. Of the numerous company, three only
take any serious part in the discussion; nor are we informed
whether in the evening they went to the torch-race, or talked, as
in the Symposium, through the night. The manner in which the
conversation has arisen is described as follows :- Socrates and his Steph.
companion Glaucon are about to leave the festival when they are 3*7
detained by a message from Polemarchus, who speedily appears
accompanied by Adeimantus, the brother of Glaucon, and with
playful violence compels them to remain, promising them not only

Analysis 328-331. xvii

328 the torch-race, but the pleasure of conversation with the young, Republic

which to Socrates is a far greater attraction. They return to the

ANALYSIS.

house of Cephalus, Polemarchus' father, now in extreme old age,
who is found sitting upon a cushioned seat crowned for a sacrifice.
' You" should come to me oftener, Socrates, for I am too old to go
to you ; and at my time of life, having lost other pleasures, I care
the more for conversation.' Socrates asks him what he thinks of

329 age, to which the old man replies, that the sorrows and discontents
of age are to be attributed to the tempers of men, and that age is a
time of peace in which the tyranny of the passions is no longer
felt. Yes, replies Socrates, but the world will say, Cephalus, that
you are happy in old age because you are rich. 'And there is
something in what they say, Socrates, but not so much as they

330 imagine — as Themistocles replied to the Seriphian, " Neither you,
if you had been an Athenian, nor I, if I had been a Seriphian,
would ever have been famous," I might in like manner reply to
you, Neither a good poor man can be happy in age, nor yet a bad
rich man.' Socrates remarks that Cephalus appears not to care
about riches, a quality which he ascribes to his having inherited,
not acquired them, and would like to know what he considers to
be the chief advantage of them. Cephalus answers that when
you are old the belief in the world below grows upon you, and

331 then to have done justice and never to have been compelled to
do injustice through poverty, and never to have deceived any
one, are felt to be unspeakable blessings. Socrates, who is
evidently preparing for an argument, next asks, What is the
meaning of the word justice ? To tell the truth and pay your
debts? No more than this? Or must we admit exceptions?
Ought I, for example, to put back into the hands of my friend,
who has gone mad, the sword which I borrowed of him when he
was in his right mind ? ' There must be exceptions.' ' And yet/
says Polemarchus, ' the definition which has been given has the
authority of Simonides.' Here Cephalus retires to look after the
sacrifices, and bequeaths, as Socrates facetiously remarks, the
possession of the argument to his heir, Polemarchus

The description of old age is finished, and Plato, as his manner INTRODUC-
is, has touched the key-note of the whole work in asking for the
definition of justice, first suggesting the question which Glaucon
afterwards pursues respecting external goods, and preparing for

c

xviii Analysis 332-335.

Republic the concluding mythus of the world below in the slight allusion of
Cephalus. The portrait of the just man is a natural frontispiece or

introduction to the long discourse which follows, and may perhaps
imply that in all our perplexity about the nature of justice, there
is no difficulty in discerning * who is a just man.' The first ex-
planation has been supported by a saying of Simonides ; and now
Socrates has a mind to show that the resolution of justice into two
unconnected precepts, which have no common principle, fails to
satisfy the demands of dialectic.
ANALYSIS. ..... He proceeds : What did Simonides mean by this saying of 332

his ? Did he mean that I was to give back arms to a madman ? * No,
not in that case, not if the parties are friends, and evil would result.
He meant that you were to do what was .proper, good to friends
and harm to enemies.' Every act does something to somebody ;
and following this analogy, Socrates asks, What is this due and
proper thing which justice does, and to whom ? He is answered
that justice does good to friends and harm to enemies. But in
what way good or harm ? ' In making alliances with the one, and
going to war with the other.' Then in time of peace what is the
good of justice ? The answer is that justice is of use in contracts, 333
and contracts are money partnerships. Yes ; but how in such
partnerships is the just man of more use than any other man ?
' When you want to have money safely kept and not used.' Then
justice will be useful when money is useless. And there is another
difficulty : justice, like the art of war or any other art, must be of
opposites, good at attack as well as at defence, at stealing as well 334
as at guarding. But then justice is a thief, though a hero notwith-
standing, like Autolycus, the Homeric hero, who was ' excellent
above all men in theft and perjury ' — to such a pass have you and
Homer and Simonides brought us ; though I do not forget that the
thieving must be for the good of friends and the harm of enemies.
And still there arises another question : Are friends to be in-
terpreted as real or seeming ; enemies as real or seeming ? And 335
are our friends to be only the good, and our enemies to be the
evil ? The answer is, that we must do good to our seeming and
real good friends, and evil to our seeming and real evil enemies —
good to the good, evil to the evil. But ought we to render evil for
evil at all, when to do so will only make men more evil ? Can
justice produce injustice any more than the art of horsemanship

The early stages of morality. xix

can make bad horsemen, or heat produce cold ? The final con- Republic

I.

ANALYSIS.

elusion is, that no sage or poet ever said that the just return evil '

for evil ; this was a maxim of some rich and mighty man, Peri-
336 ander, Perdiccas, or Ismenias the Theban (about B.C. 398-381)

Thus the first stage of aphoristic or unconscious morality is
shown to be inadequate to the wants of the age ; the authority
of the poets is set aside, and through the winding mazes of
dialectic we make an approach to the Christian precept of for-
giveness of injuries. Similar words are applied by the Persian
mystic poet to the Divine being when the questioning spirit is
stirred within him : — ' If because I do evil, Thou punishest me
by evil, what is the difference between Thee and me ? ' In this
both Plato and Kheyam rise above the level of many Christian (?)
theologians. The first definition of justice easily passes into the
second ; for the simple words 'to speak the truth and pay your debts1
is substituted the more abstract ' to do good to your friends and
harm to your enemies.' Either of these explanations gives a sufficient
rule of life for plain men, but they both fall short of the precision
of philosophy. We may note in passing the antiquity of casuistry,
which not only arises out of the conflict of established principles
in particular cases, but also out of the effort to attain them, and
is prior as well as posterior to our fundamental notions of
morality. The ' interrogation * of moral ideas ; the appeal to
the authority of Homer; the conclusion that the maxim, 'Do
good to your friends and harm to your enemies,' being erroneous,
could not have been the word of any great man (cp. ii. 380 A, B),
are all of them very characteristic of the Platonic Socrates.

. . . Here Thrasymachus, who has made several attempts to ANALYSIS.
interrupt, but has hitherto been kept in order by the company,
takes advantage of a pause and rushes into the arena, beginning,
like a savage animal, with a roar. < Socrates,' he says, ' what
folly is this? — Why do you agree to be vanquished by one
another in a pretended argument ? ' He then prohibits all the

337 ordinary definitions of justice ; to which Socrates replies that
he cannot tell how many twelve is, if he is forbidden to say
2 x 6, or 3 x 4, or 6 x 2, or 4 x 3. At first Thrasymachus is reluctant

338 to argue ; but at length, with a promise of payment on the part of

C 2

xx Analysis 338-343.

Republic the company and of praise from Socrates, he is induced to open
ANALYSIS the §ame- ' Listen,' he says ; * my answer is that might is right,
justice the interest of the stronger : now praise me.3 Let me
understand you first. Do you mean that because Polydamas the
wrestler, who is stronger than we are, finds the eating of beef
for his interest, the eating of beef is also for our interest, who
are not so strong ? Thrasymachus is indignant at the illustration,
and in pompous words, apparently intended to restore dignity to
the argument, he explains his meaning to be that the rulers make
laws for their own interests. But suppose, says Socrates, that the 339
ruler or stronger makes a mistake — then the interest of the
stronger is not his interest Thrasymachus is saved from this
speedy downfall by his disciple Cleitophon, who introduces the 340
word ' thinks ; '—not the actual interest of the ruler, but what he
thinks or what seems to be his interest, is justice. The contra-
diction is escaped by the unmeaning evasion : for though his real
and apparent interests may differ, what the ruler thinks to be his
interest will always remain what he thinks to be his interest.

Of course this was not the original assertion, nor is the new
interpretation accepted by Thrasymachus himself. But Socrates
is not disposed to quarrel about words, if, as he significantly
insinuates, his adversary has changed his mind. In what follows
Thrasymachus does in fact withdraw his admission that the ruler
may make a mistake, for he affirms that the ruler as a ruler is
infallible. Socrates is quite ready to accept the new position, 341
which he equally turns against Thrasymachus by the help of
the analogy of the arts. Every art or science has an interest, but 342
this interest is to be distinguished from the accidental interest
of the artist, and is only concerned with the good of the things or
persons which come under the art. And justice has an interest
which is the interest not of the ruler or judge, but of those
who come under his sway.

Thrasymachus is on the brink of the inevitable conclusion,
when he makes a bold diversion. 'Tell me, Socrates,' he says, 343
' have you a nurse ? ' What a question ! Why do you ask ?
' Because, if you have, she neglects you and lets you go about
drivelling, and has not even taught you to know the shepherd
from the' sheep. For you fancy that shepherds and rulers never
think of their own interest, but only of their sheep or subjects,

Analysis 343-347. xxi

whereas the truth is that they fatten them for their use, sheep and Republic
subjects alike. And experience proves that in every relation ANAL'
of life the just man is the loser and the unjust the gainer,

344 especially where injustice is on the grand scale, which is quite
another thing from the petty rogueries of swindlers and burglars
and robbers of temples. The language of men proves this — our
'gracious' and 'blessed3 tyrant and the like — all which tends to
show (i) that justice is the interest of the stronger ; and (2) that
injustice is more profitable and also stronger than justice.'

Thrasymachus, who is better at a speech than at a close
argument, having deluged the company with words, has a mind

345 to escape. But the others will not let him go, and Socrates adds
a humble but earnest request that he will not desert them at
such a crisis of their fate. ' And what can I do more for you ? '
he says ; ' would you have me put the words bodily into your
souls?' God forbid! replies Socrates; but we want you to
be consistent in the use of terms, and not to employ * physician '
in an exact sense, and then again ' shepherd ' or ' ruler ' in an
inexact, — if the words are strictly taken, the ruler and the
shepherd look only to the good of their people or flocks and
not to their own : whereas you insist that rulers are solely
actuated by love of office. ' No doubt about it,' replies Thrasy-

346 machus. Then why are they paid ? Is not the reason, that their
interest is not comprehended in their art, and is therefore the
concern of another art, the art of pay, which is common to the
arts in general, and therefore not identical with any one of them ?

347 Nor would any man be a ruler unless he were induced by the
hope of reward or the fear of punishment ; — the reward is money
or honour, the punishment is the necessity of being ruled by a
man worse than himself. And if a State [or Church] were com-
posed entirely of good men, they would be affected by the last
motive only; and there would be as much 'nolo episcopari' as
there is at present of the opposite. . . .

The satire on existing governments is heightened by the simple INTRODUC-
and apparently incidental manner in which the last remark is
introduced. There is a similar irony in the argument that the
governors of mankind do not like being in office, and that there-
fore they demand pay.

Enough of this : the other assertion of Thrasymachus is far ANALYSIS.

xxii Analysis 348-352.

Republic more important — that the unjust life is more gainful than the just.

ANA YSIS N°w> as y°u an<* Ii Glaucon, are not convinced by him, we must 348
reply to him ; but if we try to compare their respective gains
we shall want a judge to decide for us ; we had better therefore
proceed by making mutual admissions of the truth to one another.
Thrasymachus had asserted that perfect injustice was more
gainful than perfect justice, and after a little hesitation he is
induced by Socrates to admit the still greater paradox that in- 349
justice is virtue and justice vice. Socrates praises his frankness,
and assumes the attitude of one whose only wish is to understand
the meaning of his opponents. At the same time he is weaving
a net in which Thrasymachus is finally enclosed. The admission
is elicited from him that the just man seeks to gain an advantage
over the unjust only, but not over the just, while the unjust
would gain an advantage over either. Socrates, in order to test
this statement, employs once more the favourite analogy of the
arts. The musician, doctor, skilled artist of any sort, does not 350
seek to gain more than the skilled, but only more than the
unskilled (that is to say, he works up to a rule, standard, law,
and does not exceed it), whereas the unskilled makes random
efforts at excess. Thus the skilled falls on the side of the good,
and the unskilled on the side of the evil, and the just is the skilled,
and the unjust is the unskilled.

There was great difficulty in bringing Thrasymachus to the
point ; the day was hot and he was streaming with perspiration,
and for the first time in his life he was seen to blush. But his
other thesis that injustice was stronger than justice has not yet
been refuted, and Socrates now proceeds to the consideration of
this, which, with the assistance of Thrasymachus, he hopes to
clear up ; the latter is at first churlish, but in the judicious hands
of Socrates is soon restored to good-humour : Is there not honour 35 1
among thieves ? Is not the strength of injustice only a remnant
of justice ? Is not absolute injustice absolute weakness also ?
A house that is divided against itself cannot stand ; two men who 35 *
quarrel detract from one another's strength, and he who is at
war with himself is -the enemy of himself and the gods. Not
wickedness therefore, but semi-wickedness flourishes in states, —
a remnant of good is needed in order to make union in action
possible, — there is no kingdom of evil in this world.

The three arguments respecting justice, xxiii

Another question has not been answered : Is the just or the Republic

353 unjust the happier ? To this we reply, that every art has an ANALySIS
end and an excellence or virtue by which the end is accomplished.

And is not the end of the soul happiness, and justice the ex-
cellence of the soul by which happiness is attained? Justice

354 and happiness being thus shown to be inseparable, the question
whether the just or the unjust is the happier has disappeared.

Thrasymachus replies : ' Let this be your entertainment,.
Socrates, at the festival of Bendis.' Yes ; and a very good
entertainment with which your kindness has supplied me, now
that you have left off scolding. And yet not a good entertainment
—but that was my own fault, for I tasted of too many things. First
of all the nature of justice was the subject of our enquiry, and
then whether justice is virtue and wisdom, or evil and folly ; and
then the comparative advantages of just and unjust : and the sum
of all is that I know not what justice is ; how then shall I know
whether the just is happy or not ? . . .

Thus the sophistical fabric has been demolished., chiefly by INTRODUC-
appealing to the analogy of the arts. 'Justice is like the arts
(i) in having no external interest, and (2) in not aiming at excess,
and (3) justice is to happiness what the implement of the work-
man is to his work.' At this the modern reader is apt to stumble,
because he forgets that Plato is writing in an age when the arts
and the virtues, like the moral and intellectual faculties, were still
undistinguished. Among early enquirers into the nature of
human action the arts helped to fill up the void of speculation ;
and at first the comparison of the arts and the virtues was not
perceived by them to be fallacious. They only saw the points of
agreement in them and not the points of difference. Virtue, like
art, must take means to an end ; good manners are both an art
and a virtue ; character is naturally described under the image
of a statue (ii. 361 D ; vii. 540 C) ; and there are many other figures
of speech which are readily transferred from art to morals. The
next generation cleared up these perplexities ; or at least supplied
after ages with a further analysis of them. The contemporaries
of Plato • were in a state of transition, and had not yet fully
realized the common-sense distinction of Aristotle, that 'virtue
is concerned with action, art with production ' (Nic. Eth. vi. 4),
or that 'virtue implies intention and constancy of purpose/

xxiv The just is of the nature of the finite.

Republic whereas ' art requires knowledge only ' (Nic. Eth. ii. 3). And yet
*' in the absurdities which follow from some uses of the analogy

INTRODUC-
TION, (cp. i. 333 E, 334 B), there seems to be an intimation conveyed that

virtue is more than art. This is implied in the reductio ad ab-
surdum that 'justice is a thief,' and in the dissatisfaction which
Socrates expresses at the final result.

The expression ' an art of pay ' (i. 346 B) which is described as
'common to all the arts' is not in accordance with the ordinary use
of language. Nor is it employed elsewhere either by Plato or by
any other Greek writer. It is suggested by the argument, and
seems to extend the conception of art to doing as well as making.
Another flaw or inaccuracy of language may be noted in the words
(i. 335 C) 'men who are injured are made more unjust.' For
those who are injured are not necessarily made worse, but only
harmed or ill-treated.

The second of the three arguments, 'that the just does not
aim at excess,' has a real meaning, though wrapped up in an
enigmatical form. That the good is of the nature of the finite
is a peculiarly Hellenic sentiment, which may be compared with
the language of those modern writers who speak of virtue as
fitness, and of freedom as obedience to law. The mathematical
or logical notion of limit easily passes into an ethical one, and
even finds a mythological expression in the conception of envy
(<j)66vos). Ideas of measure, equality, order, unity, proportion, still
linger in the writings of moralists ; and the true spirit of the fine
arts is better conveyed by such terms than by superlatives.

'When workmen strive to do better than well,
They do confound their skill in covetousness.'

(King John, Act iv. Sc. 2.)

The harmony of the soul and body (iii. 402 D), and of the parts of the
soul with one another (iv. 442 C), a harmony ' fairer than that of
musical notes,' is the true Hellenic mode of conceiving the per-
fection of human nature.

In what may be called the. epilogue of the discussion with
Thrasymachus, Plato argues that evil is not a principle of
strength, but of discord and dissolution, just touching the question
which has been often treated in modern times by theologians
and philosophers, of the negative nature of evil (cp. on the other
hand x. 610). In the last argument we trace the germ of the

Analysis 357-359. xxv

Aristotelian doctrine of an end and a virtue directed towards the Republic
end, which again is suggested by the arts. The final recon- INTRODUC
cilement of justice and happiness and the identity of the individual TION-
and the State are also intimated. Socrates reassumes the character
of a ' know-nothing ; ' at the same time he' appears to be not
wholly satisfied with the manner in which the argument has
been conducted. Nothing- is concluded ; but the tendency of the
dialectical process, here as always, is to enlarge our conception of
ideas, and to widen their application to human life.

Steph. BOOK II. Thrasymachus is pacified, but the intrepid Glaucon ANALYSIS.

35? insists on continuing the argument. He is not satisfied with the
indirect manner in which, at the end of the last book, Socrates
had disposed of the question 'Whether the just or the unjust
is the happier.' He begins by dividing goods into three classes :
— first, goods desirable in themselves ; secondly, goods desirable
in themselves and for their results; thirdly, goods desirable for
their results only. He then asks Socrates in which of the three

358 classes he would place justice. In the second class, replies
Socrates, among goods desirable for themselves and also for their
results. 'Then the world in general are of another mind, for
they say that justice belongs to the troublesome class of goods
which are desirable for their results only. Socrates answers that
this is the doctrine of Thrasymachus which he rejects. Glaucon
thinks that Thrasymachus was too ready to listen to the voice
of the charmer, and proposes to consider the nature of justice
and injustice in themselves and apart from the results and rewards
of them which the world is always dinning in his ears. He will
first of all speak of the nature and origin of justice ; secondly,
of the manner in which men view justice as a necessity and
not a good; and thirdly, he will prove the reasonableness of
this view.

* To do injustice is said to be a good ; to suffer injustice an evil.
As the evil is discovered by experience to be greater than the

359 g°°dj tne sufferers, who cannot also be doers, make a compact
that they will have neither, and this compact or mean is called
justice, but is really the impossibility of doing injustice. No one
would observe such a compact if he were not obliged. Let us
suppose that the just and unjust have two rings, like that of Gyges

xxvi Analysis 360-363.

Republic in the well-known story, which make them invisible, and then 360
' no difference will appear in them, for every one will do evil if
he can. And he who abstains will be regarded by the world
as a fool for his pains. Men may praise him in public out
of fear for themselves, but they will laugh at him in their hearts.
(Cp. Gorgias, 483 B.)

1 And now let us frame an ideal of the just and unjust. Imagine
the unjust man to be master of his craft, seldom making mistakes
and easily correcting them ; having gifts of money, speech, 361
strength — the greatest villain bearing the highest character : and
at his side let us place the just in his nobleness and simplicity —
being, not seeming — without name or reward — clothed in his
justice only — the best of men who is thought to be the worst,
and let him die as he has lived. I might add (but I would rather
put the rest into the mouth of the panegyrists of injustice — they
will tell you) that the just man will be scourged, racked, bound,
will have his eyes put out, and will at last be crucified [literally
impaled} — and all this because he ought to have preferred seeming
to being. How different is the case of the unjust who clings 362
to appearance as the true reality ! His high character makes him
a ruler ; he can marry where he likes, trade where he likes, help
his friends and hurt his enemies ; having got rich by dishonesty
he can worship the gods better, and will therefore be more loved
by them than the just.'

I was thinking what to answer, when Adeimantus joined in the
already unequal fray. He considered that the most important
point of all had been omitted :— ' Men are taught to be just for
the sake of rewards ; parents and guardians make reputation the 363
incentive to virtue. And other advantages are promised by them
of a more solid kind, such as wealthy marriages and high offices.
There are the pictures in Homer and Hesiod of fat sheep and
heavy fleeces, rich corn-fields and trees toppling with fruit, which
the gods provide in this life for the just. And the Orphic poets
add a similar picture of another. The heroes of Musaeus and
Eumolpus lie on couches at a festival, with garlands on their
heads, enjoying as the meed of virtue a paradise of immortal
drunkenness. Some go further, and speak of a fair posterity in the
third and fourth generation. But the wicked they bury in a slough
and make them carry water in a sieve : and in this life they

Analysis 364-366. xxvii

attribute to them the infamy which Glaucon was assuming to be Republic
the lot of the just who are supposed to be unjust. ANALYSIS

364 ' Take another kind of argument which is found both in poetry
and prose : — " Virtue," as Hesiod says, " is honourable but difficult,
vice is easy and profitable." You may often see the wicked in
great prosperity and the righteous afflicted by the will of heaven.
And mendicant prophets knock at rich men's doors, promising to
atone for the sins of themselves or their fathers in an easy fashion
with sacrifices and festive games, or with charms and invocations
to get rid of an enemy good or bad by divine help and at a small
charge ; — they appeal to books professing to be written by
Musaeus and Orpheus, and carry away the minds of whole
cities, and promise to " get souls out of purgatory ; " and if we

365 refuse to listen to them, no one knows what will happen to us.

'When a lively-minded ingenuous youth hears all this, what
will be his conclusion ? " Will he," in the language of Pindar,
" make justice his high tower, or fortify himself with crooked
deceit?" Justice, he reflects, without the appearance of justice,
is misery and ruin ; injustice has the promise of a glorious life.
Appearance is master of truth and lord of happiness. To appear-
ance then I will turn, — I will put on the show of virtue and trail
behind me the fox of Archilochus. I hear some one saying that
" wickedness is not easily concealed," to which I reply that " nothing
great is easy." Union and force and rhetoric will do much ; and
if men say that they cannot prevail over the gods, still how do
we know that there are gods ? Only from the poets, who acknow-

366 ledge that they may be appeased by sacrifices. Then why not
sin and pay for indulgences out of your sin ? For if the righteous
are only unpunished, still they have no further reward, while
the wicked may be unpunished and have the pleasure of sinning
too. But what of the world below? Nay, says the argument,
there are atoning powers who will set that matter right, as the
poets, who are the sons of the gods, tell us ; and this is confirmed
by the authority of the State.

' How can we resist such arguments in favour of injustice ? Add
good manners, and, as the wise tell us, we shall make the best of
both worlds. Who that is not a miserable caitiff will refrain from
smiling at the praises of justice ? Even if a man knows the better
part he will not be angry with others ; for he knows also that

T1ON.

xxviii False bases of morality.

Reptiblic more than human virtue is needed to save a man, and that he only

ANALYSIS Praises justice who is incapable of injustice.

'The origin of the evil is that all men from the beginning,
heroes, poets, instructors of youth, have always asserted " the
temporal dispensation," the honours and profits of justice. Had
we been taught in early youth the power of justice and injustice 367
inherent in the soul, and unseen by any human or divine eye, we
should not have needed others to be our guardians, but every one
would have been the guardian of himself. This is what I want
you to show, Socrates \ — other men use arguments which rather
tend to strengthen the position of Thrasymachus that " might is
right;" but from you I expect better things. And please, as
Glaucon said, to exclude reputation ; let the just be thought
unjust and the unjust just, and do you still prove to us the
superiority of justice.' . . .

INTRODUC- The thesis, which for the sake of argument has been maintained
by Glaucon, is the converse of that of Thrasymachus— not right is
the interest of the stronger, but right is the necessity of the
weaker. Starting from the same premises he carries the analysis
of society a step further back ; — might is still right, but the might
is the weakness of the many combined against the strength of the
few.

There have been theories in modern as well as in ancient times
which have a family likeness to the speculations of Glaucon ; e. g.
that power is the foundation of right ; or that a monarch has a
divine right to govern well or ill ; or that virtue is self-love or the
love of power ; or that war is the natural state of man ; or that
private vices are public benefits. All such theories have a kind of
plausibility from their partial agreement with experience. For
human nature oscillates between good and evil, and the motives of
actions and the origin of institutions may be explained to a certain
extent on either hypothesis according to the character or point of
view of a particular thinker. The obligation of maintaining
authority under all circumstances and sometimes by rather
questionable means is felt strongly and has become a sort of
instinct among civilized men. The divine right of kings, or more
generally of governments, is one of the forms under which this
natural feeling is expressed. Nor again is there any evil which
has not some accompaniment of good or pleasure ; nor any good

Justice and happiness. xxix

which is free from some alloy of evil ; nor any noble or generous Republic
thought which may not be attended by a shadow or the ghost of a INTROI)L.C
shadow of self-interest or of self-love. We know that all human TION-
actions are imperfect ; but we do not therefore attribute them to
the worse rather than to the better motive or principle. Such a
philosophy is both foolish and false, like that opinion of the clever
rogue who assumes all other men to be like himself (iii. 409 C).
And theories of this sort do not represent the real nature of the
State, which is based on a vague sense of right gradually cor-
rected and enlarged by custom and law (although capable also
of perversion), any more than they describe the origin of society,
which is to be sought in the family and in the social and religious
feelings of man. Nor do they represent the average character of
individuals, which cannot be explained simply on a theory of evil,
but has always a counteracting element of good. And as men
become better such theories appear more and more untruthful to
them, because they are more conscious of their own disinterested-
ness. A little experience may make a man a cynic ; a great deal
will bring him back to a truer and kindlier view of the mixed
nature of himself and his fellow men.

The two brothers ask Socrates to prove to them that the just is
happy when they have taken from him all that in which happiness
is ordinarily supposed to consist. Not that there is (i) any
absurdity in the attempt to frame a notion of justice apart from
circumstances. For the ideal must always be a paradox when
compared with the ordinary conditions of human life. Neither
the Stoical ideal nor the Christian ideal is true as a fact, but they
may serve as a basis of education, and may exercise an ennobling
influence. An ideal is none the worse because. ' some one has
made the discovery ' that no such ideal was ever realized. (Cp. v.
472 D.) And in a few exceptional individuals ' who are raised
above the ordinary level of humanity, the ideal of happiness may
be realized in death and misery. This may be the state which
the reason deliberately approves, and which the utilitarian as
well as every other moralist may be bound in certain cases to
prefer.

Nor again, (2) must we forget that Plato, though he agrees
generally with the view implied in the argument of the two
brothers, is not expressing his own final conclusion, but rather

xxx Justice and the appearance of justice.

Republic seeking to dramatize one of the aspects of ethical truth. He is

developing his idea gradually in a series of positions or situations.

He is exhibiting Socrates for the first time undergoing the
Socratic interrogation. Lastly, (3) the word ' happiness ' involves
some degree of confusion because associated in the language of
modern philosophy with conscious pleasure or satisfaction, which
was not equally present to his mind.

Glaucon has been drawing a picture of the misery of the just
and the happiness of the unjust, to which the misery of the tyrant
in Book IX is the answer and parallel. And still the unjust must
appear just ; that is * the homage which vice pays to virtue.' But
now Adeimantus, taking up the hint which had been already given
by Glaucon (ii. 358 C), proceeds to show that in the opinion of
mankind justice is regarded only for the sake of rewards and
reputation, and points out the advantage which is given to such
arguments as those of Thrasymachus and Glaucon by the conven-
tional morality of mankind. He seems to feel the difficulty of
'justifying the ways of God to man.' Both the brothers touch
upon the question, whether the morality of actions is determined
by their consequences (cp. iv. 420 foil.) ; and both of them go
beyond the position of Socrates, that justice belongs to the class of
goods not desirable for themselves only, but desirable for them-
selves and for their results, to which he recalls them. In their
attempt to view justice as an internal principle, and in their
condemnation of the poets, they anticipate him. The common life
of Greece is not enough for them ; they must penetrate deeper into
the nature of things.

It has been objected that justice is honesty in the sense of
Glaucon and Adeimantus, but is taken by Socrates to mean all
virtue. May we not more truly say that the old-fashioned notion
of justice is enlarged by Socrates, and becomes equivalent to
universal order or well-being, first in the State, and secondly
in the individual ? He has found a new answer to his old ques-
tion (Protag. 329), 'whether the virtues are one or many,' viz. that
one is the ordering principle of the three others. In seeking
to establish the purely internal nature of justice, he is met by
the fact that man is a social being, and he tries to harmonise
the two opposite theses as well as he can. There is no more
inconsistency in this than was inevitable in his age and country ;

Justice in the state. xxxi

there is no use in turning upon him the cross lights of modern Republic
philosophy, which, from some other point of view, would appear
equally inconsistent. Plato does not give the final solution of
philosophical questions for us ; nor can he be judged of by our
standard.

The remainder of the Republic is developed out of the question
of the sons of Ariston. Three points are deserving of remark
in what immediately follows : — First, that the answer of Socrates
is altogether indirect. He does not say that happiness consists in
the contemplation of the idea of justice, and still less will he
be tempted to affirm the Stoical paradox that the just man can be
happy on the rack. But first he dwells on the difficulty of the
problem and insists on restoring man to his natural condition,
before he will answer the question at all. He too will frame
an ideal, but his ideal comprehends not only abstract justice,
but the whole relations of man. Under the fanciful illustration of
the large letters he implies that he will only look for justice in
society, and that from the State he will proceed to the individual.
His answer in substance amounts to this,— that under favourable
conditions, i.e. in the perfect State, justice and happiness will
coincide, and that when justice has been once found, happiness
may be left to take care of itself. That he falls into some degree
of inconsistency, when in the tenth book (612 A) he claims to have
got rid of the rewards and honours of justice, may be admitted ;
for he has left those which exist in the perfect State. And
the philosopher ' who retires under the shelter of a wall ' (vi. 496)
can hardly have been esteemed happy by him, at least not in this
world. Still he maintains the true attitude of moral action.
Let a man do his duty first, without asking whether he will be
happy or not, and happiness will be the inseparable accident
which attends him. ' Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his
righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.'

Secondly, it may be remarked that Plato preserves the genuine
character of Greek thought in beginning with the State and
in going on to the individual. First ethics, then politics— this is
the order of ideas to us ; the reverse is the order of history. Only
after many struggles of thought does the individual assert his
right as a moral being. In early ages he is not one, but one
of many, the citizen of a State which is prior to him ; and he

xxx

Collective and individual action.

Republic

ANALYSIS.

has no notion of good or evil apart from the law of his country or
tne creed °f ms church. And to this type he is constantly tending
to revert, whenever the influence of custom, or of party spirit, or
the recollection of the past becomes too strong for him.

Thirdly, we may observe the confusion or identification of the
individual and the State, of ethics and politics, which pervades
early Greek speculation, and even in modern times retains a
certain degree of influence. The subtle difference between the
collective and individual action of mankind seems to have escaped
early thinkers, and we too are sometimes in danger of for-
getting the conditions of united human action, whenever we either
elevate politics into ethics, or lower ethics to the standard of politics.
The good man and the good citizen only coincide in the perfect
State ; and this perfection cannot be attained by legislation acting
upon them from without, but, if at all, by education fashioning
them from within.

. . . Socrates praises the sons of Ariston, ' inspired offspring of 368
the renowned hero,' as the elegiac poet terms them ; but he does
not understand how they can argue so eloquently on behalf of
injustice while their character shows that they are uninfluenced
by their own arguments. He knows not how to answer them,
although he is afraid of deserting justice in the hour of need.
He therefore makes a condition, that having weak eyes he shall
be allowed to read the large letters first and then go on to
the smaller, that is, he must look for justice in the State first,
and will then proceed to the individual. Accordingly he begins 369
to construct the State.

Society arises out of the wants of man. His first want is food ;
his second a house ; his third a coat. The sense of these needs
and the possibility of satisfying them by exchange, draw in-
dividuals together on the same spot; and this is the beginning
of a State, which we take the liberty to invent, although neces-
sity is the real inventor. There must be first a husbandman,
secondly a builder, thirdly a weaver, to which may be added
a cobbler. Four or five citizens at least are required to make
a city. Now men have different natures, and one man will do one 370
thing better than many ; and business waits for no man. Hence
there must be a division of labour into different employments ; into
wholesale and retail trade ; into workers, and makers of workmen's

Analysis 370-375. xxxiii

tools ; into shepherds and husbandmen. A city which includes all Republic
this will have far exceeded the limit of four or five, and yet not be ANALySIS

371 very large. But then again imports will be required, and im-
ports necessitate exports, and this implies variety of produce in
order to attract the taste of purchasers; also merchants and
ships. In the city too we must have a market and money and
retail trades ; otherwise buyers and sellers will never meet, and
the valuable time of the producers will be wasted in vain efforts
at exchange. If we add hired servants the State will be com-
plete. And we may guess that somewhere in the intercourse of

372 the citizens with one another justice and injustice will appear.

Here follows a rustic picture of their way of life. They spend
their days in houses which they have built for themselves ; they
make their own clothes and produce their own corn and wine.
Their principal food is meal and flour, and they drink in
moderation. They live on the best of terms with each other, and
take care not to have too many children. ' But,' said Glaucon,
interposing, ' are they not to have a relish ? ' Certainly ; they
will have salt and olives and cheese, vegetables and fruits,
and chestnuts to roast at the fire. ' 'Tis a city of pigs, Socrates.'
Why, I replied, what do you want more ? ' Only the comforts of
life,— sofas and tables, also sauces and sweets.' I see ; you want
not only a State, but a luxurious State ; and possibly in the more
complex frame we may sooner find justice and injustice. Then

373 the fine arts must go to work— every conceivable instrument and
ornament of luxury will be wanted. There will be dancers,
painters, sculptors, musicians, cooks, barbers, tire-women, nurses,
artists ; swineherds and neatherds too for the animals, and
physicians to cure the disorders of which luxury is the source. To
feed all these superfluous mouths we shall need a part of our
neighbours' land, and they will want a part of ours. And this
is the origin of war, which may be traced to the same causes

374 as other political evils. Our city will now require the slight
addition of a camp, and the citizen will be converted into a soldier.
But then again our old doctrine of the division of labour must not
be forgotten. The art of war cannot be learned in a day, and
there must be a natural aptitude for military duties. There will

375 be some warlike natures who have this aptitude— dogs keen of
scent, swift of foot to pursue, and strong of limb to fight. And

d

xxxiv Analysis 375-379.

Republic as spirit is the foundation of courage, such natures, whether of
men or animals, will be full of spirit. But these spirited natures

ANALYSIS.

are apt to bite and devour one another ; the union of gentleness to
friends and fierceness against enemies appears to be an im-
possibility, and the guardian of a State requires both qualities.
Who then can be a guardian ? The image of the dog suggests
an answer. For dogs are gentle to friends and fierce to strangers. 376
Your dog is a philosopher who judges by the rule of knowing
or not knowing; and philosophy, whether in man or beast, is
the parent of gentleness. The human watchdogs must be philo-
sophers or lovers of learning which will make them gentle. And
how are they to be learned without education ?

But what shall their education be ? Is any better than the old-
fashioned sort which is comprehended under the name of music
and gymnastic ? Music includes literature, and literature is of two 377
kinds, true and false. 'What do you mean?' he said. I mean
that children hear stories before they learn gymnastics, and that
the stories are either untrue, or have at most one or two grains
of truth in a bushel of falsehood. Now early life is very im-
pressible, and children ought not to learn what they will have
to unlearn when they grow up ; we must therefore have a censor-
ship of nursery tales, banishing some and keeping others. Some
of them are very improper, as we may see in the great instances
of Homer and Hesiod, who not only tell lies but bad lies ; stories
about Uranus and Saturn, which are immoral as well as false, 378
and which should never be spoken of to young persons, or
indeed at all ; or, if at all, then in a mystery, after the sacrifice,
not of an Eleusinian pig, but of some unprocurable animal. Shall
our youth be encouraged to beat their fathers by the example
of Zeus, or our citizens be incited to quarrel by hearing or seeing
representations of strife among the gods? Shall they listen to
the narrative of Hephaestus binding his mother, and of Zeus
sending him flying for helping her when she was beaten ? Such
tales may possibly have a mystical interpretation, but the young
are incapable of understanding allegory. If any one asks what
tales are to be allowed, we will answer that we are legislators and 379
not book-makers; we only lay down the principles according
to which books are to be written ; to write them is the duty of
others.

Analysis 379-383-

XXXV

And our first principle is, that God must be represented as he Republic
is ; not as the author of all things, but of good only. We will A
not suffer the poets to say that he is the steward of good and
evil, or that he has two casks full of destinies ;— or that Athene
and Zeus incited Pandarus to break the treaty; or that God

380 caused the sufferings of Niobe, or of Pelops, or the Trojan war ;
or that he makes men sin when he wishes to destroy them.
Either these were not the actions of the gods, or God was just,
and men were the better for being punished. But that the deed
was evil, and God the author, is a wicked, suicidal fiction which
we will allow no one, old or young, to utter. This is our first
and great principle — God is the author of good only.

And the second principle is like unto it : — With God is no vari-
ableness or change of form. Reason teaches us this ; for if we
suppose a change in God, he must be changed either by another
or by himself. By another ? — but the best works of nature and

381 art and the noblest qualities of mind are least liable to be changed
by any external force. By himself? — but he cannot change for the
better ; he will hardly change for the worse. He remains for
ever fairest and best in his own image. Therefore we refuse to
listen to the poets who tell us of Here begging in the likeness of
a priestess or of other deities who prowl about at night in
strange disguises; all that blasphemous nonsense with which
mothers fool the manhood out of their children must be sup-

382 pressed. But some one will say that God, who is himself un-
changeable, may take a form in relation to us. Why should he ?
For gods as well as men hate the lie in the soul, or principle
of falsehood ; and as for any other form of lying which is used
for a purpose and is regarded as innocent in certain exceptional
cases — what need have the gods of this ? For they are not
ignorant of antiquity like the poets, nor are they afraid of their

383 enemies, nor is any madman a friend of theirs. God then is
true, he is absolutely true; he changes not, he deceives not,
by day or night, by word or sign. This is our second great
principle— God is true. Away with the lying dream of Aga-
memnon in Homer, and the accusation of Thetis against Apollo
in Aeschylus. . . .

In order to give clearness to his conception of the State, Plato INTRODUC-

TION*

proceeds to trace the first principles of mutual need and of

da

xxxvi Political Economy in Plato.

Republic division of labour in an imaginary community of four or five

INTRODUC-

citizens. Gradually this community increases ; the division of

labour extends to countries ; imports necessitate exports ; a
medium of exchange is required, and retailers sit in the market-
place to save the time of the producers. These are the steps
by which Plato constructs the first or primitive State, introducing
the elements of political economy by the way. As he is going
to frame a second or civilized State, the simple naturally comes
before the complex. He indulges, like Rousseau, in a picture of
primitive life — an idea which has indeed often had a powerful in-
fluence on the imagination of mankind, but he does not seriously
mean to say that one is better than the other (cp. Politicus,
p. 272) ; nor can any inference be drawn from the description
of the first state taken apart from the second, such as Aristotle
appears to draw in the Politics, iv. 4, 12 (cp. again Politicus, 272).
We should not interpret a Platonic dialogue any more than a
poem or a parable in too literal or matter-of-fact a style. On
the other hand, when we compare the lively fancy of Plato with
the dried-up abstractions of modern treatises on philosophy, we
are compelled to say with Protagoras, that the ' mythus is more
interesting ' (Protag. 320 D).

Several interesting remarks which in modern times would have
a place in a treatise on Political Economy are scattered up and
down the writings of Plato : cp. especially Laws, v. 740, Population ;
viii. 847, Free Trade ; xi. 916-7, Adulteration ; 923-4,. Wills and
Bequests ; 930, Begging ; Eryxias, (though not Plato's), Value and
Demand ; Republic, ii. 369 ff., Division of Labour. The last subject,
and also the origin of Retail Trade, is treated with admirable
lucidity in the second book of the Republic. But Plato never com-
bined his economic ideas into a system, and never seems to have
recognized that Trade is one of the great motive powers of the
State and of the world. He would make retail traders only of the
inferior sort of citizens (Rep. ii. 371 ; cp. Laws, viii. 847), though he
remarks, quaintly enough (Laws, ix. 918 D), that ' if only the best
men and the best women everywhere were compelled to keep
taverns for a time or to carry on retail trade, etc., then we should
know how pleasant and agreeable all these things are.'

The disappointment of Glaucon at the ' city of pigs,' the ludi-
crous description of the ministers of luxury in the more refined

Use of fiction. xxxvii

State, and the afterthought of the necessity of doctors, the illus- Republic
tration of the nature of the guardian taken from the dog, the lNTROpUC
desirableness of offering some almost unprocurable victim when TION-
impure mysteries are to be celebrated, the behaviour of Zeus
to his father and of Hephaestus to his mother, are touches of
humour which have also a serious meaning. In speaking of
education Plato rather startles us by affirming that a child must
be trained in falsehood first and in truth afterwards. Yet this
is not very different from saying that children must be taught
through the medium of imagination as well as reason ; that their
minds can only develope gradually, and that there is much which
they must learn without understanding (cp. iii. 402 A). This is
also the substance of Plato's view, though he must be acknow-
ledged to have drawn the line somewhat differently from modern
ethical writers, respecting truth and falsehood. To us, economies
or accommodations would not be allowable unless they were
required by the human faculties or necessary for the communi-
cation of knowledge to the simple and ignorant. We should
insist that the word was inseparable from the intention, and that
we must not be ' falsely true,' i. e. speak or act falsely in support
of what was right or true. But Plato would limit the use of
fictions only by requiring that they should have a good moral
effect, and that such a dangerous weapon as falsehood should be
employed by the rulers alone and for great objects.

A Greek in the age of Plato attached no importance to the
question whether his religion was an historical fact. He was
just beginning to be conscious that the past had a history; but
he could see nothing beyond Homer and Hesiod. Whether their
narratives were true or false did not seriously affect the political
or social life of Hellas. Men only began to suspect that they
were fictions when they recognised them to be immoral. And
so in all religions : the consideration of their morality comes first,
afterwards the truth of the documents in which they are re-
corded, or of the events natural or supernatural which are told
of them. But in modern times, and in Protestant countries per-
haps more than in Catholic, we have been too much inclined to
identify the historical with the moral ; and some have refused
to believe in religion at all, unless a superhuman accuracy was
discernible jn every part of the record. The facts of an ancient

xxxviii Myth and allegory.

Republic or religious history are amongst the most important of all facts ;
J but they are frequently uncertain, and we only learn the true

lesson which is to be gathered from them when we place our-
selves above them. These reflections tend to show that the
difference between Plato and ourselves, though not unimportant,
is not so great as might at first sight appear. For we should
agree with him in placing the moral before the historical truth
of religion ; and, generally, in disregarding those errors or mis-
statements of fact which necessarily occur in the early stages of
all religions. We know also that changes in the traditions of a
country cannot be made in a day ; and are therefore tolerant of
many things which science and criticism would condemn.

We note in passing that the allegorical interpretation of mytho-
logy, said to have been first introduced as early as the sixth
century before Christ by Theagenes of Rhegium, was well estab-
lished in the age of Plato, and here, as in the Phaedrus (229-30),
though for a different reason, was rejected by him. That ana-
chronisms whether of religion or law, when men have reached
another stage of civilization, should be got rid of by fictions is in
accordance with universal experience. Great is the art of inter-
pretation ; and by a natural process, which when once discovered
was always going on, what could not be altered was explained
away. And so without any palpable inconsistency there existed
side by side two forms of religion, the tradition inherited or
invented by the poets and the customary worship of the temple ;
on the other hand, there was the religion of the philosopher, who
was dwelling in the heaven of ideas, but did not therefore refuse
to offer a cock to ^Esculapius, or to be seen saying his prayers
at the rising of the sun. At length the antagonism between the
popular and philosophical religion, never so great among the
Greeks as in our own age, disappeared, and was only felt like the
difference between the religion of the educated and uneducated
among ourselves. The Zeus of Homer and Hesiod easily passed
into the * royal mind ' of Plato (Philebus, 28) ; the giant Heracles
became the knight-errant and benefactor of mankind. These and
still more wonderful transformations were readily effected by the
ingenuity of Stoics and neo-Platonists in the two or three centuries
before and after Christ. The Greek and Roman religions were
gradually permeated by the spirit of philosophy ; having lost their

The lie in the soul. xxxix

ancient meaning, they were resolved into poetry and morality ; Republic
and probably were never purer than at the time of their decay, J
when their influence over the world was waning. TI°N.

A singular conception which occurs towards the end of the
book is the lie in the soul ; this is connected with the Platonic •
and Socratic doctrine that involuntary ignorance is worse than
voluntary. The lie in the soul is a true lie, the corruption
of the highest truth, the deception of the highest part of the
soul, from which he who is deceived has no power of delivering
himself. For example, to represent God as false or immoral, or,
according to Plato, as deluding men with appearances or as the
author of evil ; or again, to affirm with Protagoras that ' know-
ledge is sensation,' or that ' being is becoming,' or with Thrasy-
machus ' that might is right,' would have been regarded by Plato
as a lie of this hateful sort. The greatest unconsciousness of the
greatest untruth, e. g. if, in the language of the Gospels (John iv.
41), * he who was blind ' were to say ' I see,' is another aspect of the
state of mind which Plato is describing. The lie in the soul may
be further compared with the sin against the Holy Ghost (Luke
xii. 10), allowing for the difference between Greek and Christian
modes of speaking. To this is opposed the lie in words, which
is only such a deception as may occur in a play or poem, or
allegory or figure of speech, or in any sort of accommodation, —
which though useless to the gods may be useful to men in certain
cases. Socrates is here answering the question which he had
himself raised (i. 331 C) about the propriety of deceiving a mad-
man ; and he is also contrasting the nature of God and man. For
God is Truth, but mankind can only be true by appearing some-
times to be partial, or false. Reserving for another place the
greater questions of religion or education, we may note further,
(i) the approval of the old traditional education of Greece ; (2) the
preparation which Plato is making for the attack on Homer and
the poets ; (3) the preparation which he is also making for the use
of economies in the State ; (4) the contemptuous and at the
same time euphemistic manner in which here as below (iii. 390)
he alludes to the Chronique Scandaleuse of the gods.

steph. BOOK III. There is another motive in purifying religion, ANALYSIS.
which is to banish fear; for no man can be courageous who is

xl Analysis 386-389.

Republic afraid of death, or who believes the tales which are repeated by
ANALYSIS the Poets concerning the world below. They must be gently
requested not to abuse hell; they may be reminded that their
stories are both untrue and discouraging. Nor must they be
angry if we expunge obnoxious passages, such as the depressing
words of Achilles — 'I would rather be a serving- man than rule
over all the dead ; ' and the verses which tell of the squalid
mansions, the senseless shadows, the flitting soul mourning over
lost strength and youth, the soul with a gibber going beneath the 387
earth like smoke, or the souls of the suitors which flutter about like
bats. The terrors and horrors of Cocytus and Styx, ghosts and
sapless shades, and the rest of their Tartarean nomenclature, must
vanish. Such tales may have their use ; but they are not the
proper food for soldiers. As little can we admit the sorrows and
sympathies of the Homeric heroes : — Achilles, the son of Thetis,
in tears, throwing ashes on his head, or pacing up and down the
sea -shore in distraction ; or Priam, the cousin of the gods, crying
aloud, rolling in the mire. A good man is not prostrated at the
Joss of children or fortune. Neither is death terrible to him ; and
therefore lamentations over the dead should not be practised by
men of note ; they should be the concern of inferior persons only, 388
whether women or men. Still worse is the attribution of such
weakness to the gods ; as when the goddesses say, ' Alas ! my
travail ! ' and worst of all, when the king of heaven himself
laments his inability to save Hector, or sorrows over the im-
pending doom of his dear Sarpedon. Such a character of God, if
not ridiculed by our young men, is likely to be imitated by them.
Nor should our citizens be given to excess of laughter — 'Such
violent delights ' are followed by a violent re-action. The descrip- 389
tion in the Iliad of the gods shaking their sides at the clumsiness
of Hephaestus will not be ad.mitted by us. ' Certainly not.'

Truth should have a high place among the virtues, for falsehood,
as we were saying, is useless to the gods, and only useful to men
as a medicine. But this employment of falsehood must remain a
privilege of state ; the common man must not in return tell a lie to
the ruler; any more than the patient would tell a lie to his
physician, or the sailor to his captain.

In the next place our youth must be temperate, and temperance
consists in self-control and obedience to authority. That is a

Analysis 389-392. xli

lesson which Homer teaches in some places: 'The Achaeans Republic
marched on breathing prowess, in silent awe of their leaders ; ' —

ANALYSIS.

but a very different one in other places : ' O heavy with wine, who

390 hast the eyes of a dog, but the heart of a stag.' Language of the
A latter kind will not impress self-control on the minds of youth*

The same may be said about his praises of eating and drinking
and his dread of starvation ; also about the verses in which he tells
of the rapturous loves of Zeus and Here, or of how Hephaestus
once detained Ares and Aphrodite in a net on a similar occasion.
There is a nobler strain heard in the words : — ' Endure, my soul,
thou hast endured worse.' Nor must we allow our citizens to
receive bribes, or to say, ' Gifts persuade the gods, gifts reverend
kings ; ' or to applaud the ignoble advice of Phoenix to Achilles
that he should get money out of the Greeks before he assisted
them ; or the meanness of Achilles himself in taking gifts from

391 Agamemnon ; or his requiring a ransom for the body of Hector;
or his cursing of Apollo ; or his insolence to the river-god
Scamander ; or his dedication to the dead Patroclus of his own
hair which had been already dedicated to the other river-god
Spercheius ; or his cruelty in dragging the body of Hector round
the walls, and slaying the captives at the pyre : such a combina-
tion of meanness and cruelty in Cheiron's pupil is inconceivable.
The amatory exploits of Peirithous and Theseus are equally
unworthy. Either these so-called sons of gods were not the sons
of gods, or they were not such as the poets imagine them, any
more than the gods themselves are the authors of evil. The youth
who believes that such things are done by those who have the

392 blood of heaven flowing in their veins will be too ready to
imitate their example.

Enough of gods and heroes ; — what shall we say about men ?
What the poets and story-tellers say — that the wicked prosper
and the righteous are afflicted, or that justice is another's gain ?
Such misrepresentations cannot be allowed by us. But in this
we are anticipating the definition of justice, and had therefore
better defer the enquiry.

The subjects of poetry have been sufficiently treated; next
follows style. Now all poetry is a narrative of events past,
present, or to come ; and narrative is of three kinds, the simple,
the imitative, and a composition of the two. An instance will

xlii Analysis 393-398.

Republic make my meaning clear. The first scene in Homer is of the last 393
' or mixed kind, being partly description and partly dialogue. But
if you throw the dialogue into the ' oratio obliqua,' the passage
will run thus : The priest came and prayed Apollo that the 394
Achaeans might take Troy and have a safe return if Agamemnon
would only give him back his daughter; and the other Greeks
assented, but Agamemnon was wroth, and so on — The whole then
becomes descriptive, and the poet is the only speaker left ; or, if
you omit the narrative, the whole becomes dialogue. These are
the three styles — which of them is to be admitted into our State ?
* Do you ask whether tragedy and comedy are to be admitted ? '
Yes, but also something more— Is it not doubtful whether our
guardians are to be imitators at all ? Or rather, has not the ques-
tion been already answered, for we have decided that one man
cannot in his life play many parts, any more than he can act both 395
tragedy and comedy, or be rhapsodist and actor at once ? Human
nature is coined into very small pieces, and as our guardians have
their own business already, which is the care of freedom, they will
have enough to do without imitating. If they imitate they should
imitate, not any meanness or baseness, but the good only; for
the mask which the actor wears is apt to become his face.
We cannot allow men to play the parts of women, quarrelling,
weeping, scolding, or boasting against the gods,— least of all when
making love or in labour. They must not represent slaves, or
bullies, or cowards, or drunkards, or madmen, or blacksmiths, or 396
neighing horses, or bellowing bulls, or sounding rivers, or a
raging sea. A good or wise man will be willing to perform good
and wise actions, but he will be ashamed to play an inferior part
which he has never practised ; and he will prefer to employ the
descriptive style with as little imitation as possible. The man 397
who has no self-respect, on the contrary, will imitate anybody and
anything ; sounds of nature and cries of animals alike ; his whole
performance will be imitation of gesture and voice. Now in the
descriptive style there are few changes, but in the dramatic there
are a great many. Poets and musicians use either, or a compound
of both, and this compound is very attractive to youth and their
teachers as well as to the vulgar. But our State in which one man
plays one part only is not adapted for complexity. And when 398
one of these polyphonous pantomimic gentlemen offers to exhibit

Analysis 398-401. xliii

himself and his poetry we will show him every observance of Republic
respect, but at the same time tell him that there is no room for his IH'

ANALYSIS.

kind in our State ; we prefer the rough, honest poet, and will not
depart from our original models (ii. 379 foil. ; cp. Laws, vii. 817).

Next as to the music. A song or ode has three parts, — the
subject, the harmony, and the rhythm ; of which the two last are
dependent upon the first. As we banished strains of lamentation,
so we may now banish the mixed Lydian harmonies, which are
the harmonies of lamentation ; and as our citizens are to be
temperate, we may also banish convivial harmonies, such as the

399 Ionian and pure Lydian. Two remain — the Dorian and Phrygian,
the first for war, the second for peace ; the one expressive of
courage, the other of obedience or instruction or religious feeling.
And as we reject varieties of harmony, we shall also reject the
many-stringed, variously-shaped instruments which give utterance
to them, and in particular the flute, which is more complex than
any of them. The lyre and the harp may be permitted in the
town, and the Pan's-pipe in the fields. Thus we have made a
purgation of music, and will now make a purgation of metres.

400 These should be like the harmonies, simple and suitable to the
occasion. There are four notes of the tetrachord, and there
are three ratios of metre, f, f , f, which have all their charac-
teristics, and the feet have different characteristics as well as the
rhythms. But about this you and I must ask Damon, the great
musician, who speaks, if I remember rightly, of a martial measure
as well as of dactylic, trochaic, and iambic rhythms, which he
arranges so as to equalize the syllables with one another, assigning
to each the proper quantity. We only venture to affirm the
general principle that the style is to conform to the subject and the
metre to the style ; and that the simplicity and harmony of the
soul should be reflected in them all. This principle of simplicity
has to be learnt by every one in the days of his youth, and may

401 be gathered anywhere, from the creative and constructive arts, as
well as from the forms of plants and animals.

Other artists as well as poets should be warned against mean-
ness or unseemliness. Sculpture and painting equally with music
must conform to the law of simplicity. He who violates it cannot
be allowed to work in our city, and to corrupt the taste of our
citizens. For our guardians must grow up, not amid images of

xliv Analysis 401-405.

Republic deformity which will gradually poison and corrupt their souls,
ANALYSIS ^ut m a ^anc* °^ nea^tn an<^ beauty where they will drink in from
every object sweet and harmonious influences. And of all these
influences the greatest is the education given by music, which
finds a way into the innermost soul and imparts to it the sense of 402
beauty and of deformity. At first the effect is unconscious ; but
when reason arrives, then he who has been thus trained welcomes
her as the friend whom he always knew. As in learning to read,
first we acquire the elements or letters separately, and afterwards
their combinations, and cannot recognize reflections of them until
we know the letters themselves ; — in like manner we must first
attain the elements or essential forms of the virtues, and then
trace their combinations in life and experience. There is a music
of the soul which answers to the harmony of the world ; and the
fairest object of a musical soul is the fair mind in the fair body.
Some defect in the latter may be excused, but not in the formen
True love is the daughter of temperance, and temperance is 403
utterly opposed to the madness of bodily pleasure. Enough has
been said of music, which makes a fair ending with love.

Next we pass on to gymnastics ; about which I would remark,
that the soul is related to the body as a cause to an effect, and
therefore if we educate the mind we may leave the education of
the body in her charge, and need only give a general outline
of the course to be pursued. In the first place the guardians must
abstain from strong drink, for they should be the last persons to
lose their wits. Whether the habits of the palaestra are suitable 404
to them is more doubtful, for the ordinary gymnastic is a sleepy
sort of thing, and if left off suddenly is apt to endanger health.
But our warrior athletes must be wide-awake dogs, and must
also be inured to all changes of food and climate. Hence they
will require a simpler kind of gymnastic, akin to their simple
music ; and for their diet a rule may be found in Homer, who
feeds his heroes on roast meat only, and gives them no fish
although they are living at the sea-side, nor boiled meats which
involve an apparatus of pots and pans ; and, if I am not mistaken,
he nowhere mentions sweet sauces. Sicilian cookery and Attic
confections and Corinthian courtezans, which are to gymnastic
what Lydian and Ionian melodies are to music, must be forbidden.
Where gluttony and intemperance prevail the town quickly fills 405

Analysis 405-408. xlv

with doctors and pleaders ; and law and medicine give themselves Republic
airs as soon as the freemen of a State take an interest in them.

ANALYSIS.

But what can show a more disgraceful state of education than
to have to go abroad for justice because you have none of your
own at home ? And yet there is a worse stage of the same disease
— when men have learned to take a pleasure and pride in the twists
and turns of the law ; not considering how much better it would
be for them so to order their lives as to have no need of a nodding
justice. And there is a like disgrace in employing a physician,
not for the cure of wounds or epidemic disorders, but because
a man has by laziness and luxury contracted diseases which were
unknown in the days of Asclepius. How simple is the Homeric
practice of medicine. Eurypylus after he has been wounded

406 drinks a posset of Pramnian wine, which is of a heating nature ;
and yet the sons of Asclepius blame neither the damsel who gives
him the drink, nor Patroclus who is attending on him. The truth
is that this modern system of nursing diseases was introduced
by Herodicus the trainer; who, being of a sickly constitution,
by a compound of training and medicine tortured first himself and
then a good many other people, and lived a great deal longer
than he had any right. But Asclepius would not practise this art,
because he knew that the citizens of a well-ordered State have
no leisure to be ill, and therefore he adopted the ' kill or cure '
method, which artisans and labourers employ. * They must be at
their business,' they say, ' and have no time for coddling : if they

407 recover, well ; if they don't, there is an end of them.' Whereas
the rich man is supposed to be a gentleman who can afford to be
ill. Do you know a maxim of Phocylides — that 'when a man
begins to be rich ' (or, perhaps, a little sooner) ' he should practise
virtue ' ? But how can excessive care of health be inconsistent
with an ordinary occupation, and yet consistent with that practice
of virtue which Phocylides inculcates ? When a student imagines
that philosophy gives him a headache, he never does anything ;
he is always unwell. This was the reason why Asclepius and his
sons practised no such art. They were acting in the interest of
the public, and did not wish to preserve useless lives, or raise up
a puny offspring to wretched sires. Honest diseases they honestly

408 cured ; and if a man was wounded, they applied the proper
remedies, and then let him eat and drink what he liked. But

xlvi Analysis 408-411.

Republic they declined to treat intemperate and worthless subjects, even

ANALYSIS.

7//* though they might have made large fortunes out of them. As to

the story of Pindar, that Asclepius was slain by a thunderbolt for
restoring a rich man to life, that is a lie — following our old rule we
must say either that he did not take bribes, or that he was not the
son of a god.

Glaucon then asks Socrates whether the best physicians and the
best judges will not be those who have had severally the greatest
experience of diseases and of crimes. Socrates draws a distinction
between the two professions. The physician should have had
experience of disease in his own body, for he cures with his mind
and not with his body. But the judge controls mind by mind ; 409
and therefore his mind should not be corrupted by crime. Where
then is he to gain experience ? How is he to be wise and also
innocent ? When young a good man is apt to be deceived by
evil-doers, because he has no pattern of evil in himself; and
therefore the judge should be of a certain age; his youth
should have been innocent, and he should have acquired insight
into evil not by the practice of it, but by the observation of it in
others. This is the ideal of a judge ; the criminal turned detective
is wonderfully suspicious, but when in company with good men
who have experience, he is at fault, for he foolishly imagines
that every one is as bad as himself. Vice may be known of virtue,
but cannot know virtue. This is the sort of medicine and this the
sort of law which will prevail in our State ; they will be healing
arts to better natures ; but the evil body will be left to die by the 410
one, and the evil soul will be put to death by the other. And the
need of either will be greatly diminished by good music which
will give harmony to the soul, and good gymnastic which will give
health to the body. Not that this division of music and gymnastic
really corresponds to soul and body ; for they are both equally
concerned with the soul, which is tamed by the one and aroused
and sustained by the other. The two together supply our guardians
with their twofold nature. The passionate disposition when it has
too much gymnastic is hardened and brutalized, the gentle or
philosophic temper which has too much music becomes enervated.
While a man is allowing music to pour like water through the 411
funnel of his ears, the edge of his soul gradually wears away, and
the passionate or spirited element is melted out of him. Too little

Analysis 411-414. xlvii

spirit is easily exhausted ; too much quickly passes into nervous Republic
irritability. So, again, the athlete by feeding and training has

ANALYSIS.

his courage doubled, but he soon grows stupid ; he is like a wild
beast, ready to do everything by blows and nothing by counsel
or policy. There are two principles in man, reason and passion,

412 and to these, not to the soul and body, the two arts of music
and gymnastic correspond. He who mingles them in harmonious
concord is the true musician, — he shall be the presiding genius of
our State.

The next question is, Who are to be our rulers? First, the
elder must rule the younger; and the best of the elders will
be the best guardians. Now they will be the best who love their
subjects most, and think that they have a common interest with
them in the welfare of the state. These we must select; but
they must be watched at every epoch of life to see whether
they have retained the same opinions and held out against force

413 and enchantment. For time and persuasion and the love of
pleasure may enchant a man into a change of purpose, and the
force of grief and pain may compel him. And therefore our
guardians must be men who have been tried by many tests,
like gold in the refiner's fire, and have been passed first through
danger, then through pleasure, and at every age have come
out of such trials victorious and without stain, in full command
of themselves and their principles ; having all their faculties
in harmonious exercise for their country's good. These shall

414 receive the highest honours both in life and death. (It would
perhaps be better to confine the term ' guardians' to this select
class : the younger men may be called ' auxiliaries.')

And now for one magnificent lie, in the belief of which, Oh that
we could train our rulers !— at any rate let us make the attempt
with the rest of the world. What I am going to tell is only a
another version of the legend of Cadmus ; but our unbelieving
generation will be slow to accept such a story. The tale must
be imparted, first to the rulers, then to the soldiers, lastly to
the people. We will inform them that their youth was a dream,
and that during the time when they seemed to be undergoing
their education they were really being fashioned in the earth,
who sent them up when they were ready; and that they must
protect and cherish her -whose children they are, and regard

xlviii Analysis 414-417.

Republic each other as brothers and sisters. ' I do not wonder at your
ANALYSIS ^einS ashamed to propound such a fiction.' There is more

behind. These brothers and sisters have different natures, and 415
some of them God framed to rule, whom he fashioned of gold ;
others he made of silver, to be auxiliaries ; others again to be
husbandmen and craftsmen, and these were formed by him of
brass and iron. But as they are all sprung from a common stock,
a golden parent may have a silver son, or a silver parent a golden
son, and then there must be a change of rank ; the son of the
rich must descend, and the child of the artisan rise, in the social
scale ; for an oracle says ' that the State will come to an end if
governed by a man of brass or iron.' Will our citizens ever
believe all this ? ' Not in the present generation, but in the next,
perhaps, Yes.'

Now let the earthborn men go forth under the command of
their rulers, and look about and pitch their camp in a high place,
which will be safe against enemies from without, and likewise
against insurrections* from within. There let them sacrifice and
set up their tents; for soldiers they are to be and not shop- 416
keepers, the watchdogs and guardians of the sheep ; and luxury
and avarice will turn them into wolves and tyrants. Their habits
and their dwellings should correspond to their education. They
should have no property; their pay should only meet their
expenses; and they should have common meals. Gold and
silver we will tell them that they have from God, and this divine
gift in their souls they must not alloy with that earthly dross 417
which passes under the name of gold. They only of the citizens
may not touch it, or be under the same roof with it, or drink
from it ; it is the accursed thing. Should they ever acquire
houses or lands or money of their own, they will become house-
holders and tradesmen instead of guardians, enemies and tyrants
instead of helpers, and the hour of ruin, both to themselves and
the rest of the State, will be at hand.

TION.

INTRODUC- The religious and ethical aspect of Plato's education will here-
after be considered under a separate head. Some lesser points
may be more conveniently noticed in this place.

i. The constant appeal to the authority of Homer, whom, with
grave irony, Plato, after the manner of his age, summons as a

Plato s employment of Homer. xlix

witness about ethics and psychology, as well as about diet and Republic
medicine ; attempting to distinguish the better lesson from the
worse (390), sometimes altering the text from design (388, and, TICK.
perhaps, 389) ; more than once quoting or alluding to Homer
inaccurately (391, 406), after the manner of the early logographers
turning the Iliad into prose (393), and delighting to draw far-
fetched inferences from his words, or to make ludicrous appli-
cations of them. He does not, like Heracleitus, get into a rage with
Homer and Archilochus (Heracl. Frag. 119, ed. Bywater), but uses
their words and expressions as vehicles of a higher truth ; not on
a system like Theagenes of Rhegium or Metrodorus, or in later
times the Stoics, but as fancy may dictate. And the conclusions
drawn from them are sound, although the premises are fictitious.
These fanciful appeals to Homer add a charm to Plato's style,
and at the same time they have the effect of a satire on the
follies of Homeric interpretation. To us (and probably to him-
self), although they take the form of arguments, they are really
figures of speech. They may be compared with modern citations
from Scripture, which have often a great rhetorical power even
when the original meaning of the words is entirely lost sight of.
The real, like the Platonic Socrates, as we gather from the Me-
morabilia of Xenophon, was fond of making similar adaptations
(i. 2, 58; ii. 6, n). Great in all ages and countries, in religion as
well as in law and literature, has been the art of interpretation.

2. 'The style is to conform to the subject and the metre to the
style.' Notwithstanding the fascination which the word 'classical*
exercises over us, we can hardly maintain that this rule is
observed in all the Greek poetry which has come down to us.
We cannot deny that the thought often exceeds the power of
lucid expression in ^Eschylus and Pindar ; or that rhetoric gets
the better of the thought in the Sophist-poet Euripides. Only
perhaps in Sophocles is there a perfect harmony of the two ;
in him alone do we find a grace of language like the beauty of a
Greek statue, in which there is nothing to add or to take away ;
at least this is true of single plays or of large portions of them.
The connection in the Tragic Choruses and in the Greek lyric poets
is not unfrequently a tangled thread which in an age before logic
the poet was unable to draw out. Many thoughts and feelings
mingled in his mind, and he had no power of disengaging or

e

1 Style and subject in Poetry.

Republic arranging them. For there is a subtle influence of logic which
re<luires to ke transferred from prose to poetry, just as the music
and perfection of language are infused by poetry into prose. In
all ages the poet has been a bad judge of his own meaning
(Apol. 22 B) ; for he does not see that the word which is full of
associations to his own mind is difficult and unmeaning to that
of another; or that the sequence which is clear to himself is
puzzling to others. There are many passages in some of our
greatest modern poets which are far too obscure ; in which there
is no proportion between style and subject; in which any half-
expressed figure, any harsh construction, any distorted collo-
cation of words, any remote sequence of ideas is admitted ; and
there is no voice ' coming sweetly from nature,' or music adding
the expression of feeling to thought. As if there could be poetry
without beauty, or beauty without ease and clearness. The
obscurities of early Greek poets arose necessarily out of the state
of language and logic which existed in their age. They are not
examples to be followed by us ; for the use of language ought
in every generation to become clearer and clearer. Like Shake-
spere, they were great in spite, not in consequence, of their
imperfections of expression. But there is no reason for returning
to the necessary obscurity which prevailed in the infancy of
literature. The English poets of the last century were certainly
not obscure ; and we have no excuse for losing what they had
gained, or for going back to the earlier or transitional age which
preceded them. The thought of our own times has not out-
stripped language ; a want of Plato's ' art of measuring ' is the
real cause of the disproportion between them.

3. In the third book of the Republic a nearer approach is made
to a theory of art than anywhere else in Plato. His views may
be summed up as follows :— True art is not fanciful and imitative,
but simple and ideal,— the expression of the highest moral
energy, whether in action or repose. To live among works of
plastic art which are of this noble and simple character, or to
listen to such strains, is the best of influences, — the true Greek
atmosphere, in which youth should be brought up. That is the
way to create in them a natural good taste, which will have a
feeling of truth and beauty in all things. For though the poets
are to be expelled, still art is recognized as another aspect of

Plato s theory of Art. li

reason — like love in the Symposium, extending over the same Republic
sphere, but confined to the preliminary education, and acting IN^'UC
through the power of habit (vii. 522 A) ; and this conception of tl°*!-
art is not limited to strains of music or the forms of plastic art,
but pervades all nature and has a wide kindred in the world. The
Republic of Plato, like the Athens of Pericles, has an artistic as
well as a political side.

There is hardly any mention in Plato of the creative arts ; only
in two or three passages does he even allude to them (cp.
Rep. iv. 420; Soph. 236 A). He is not lost in rapture at the
great works of Phidias, the Parthenon, the Propylea, the
statues of Zeus or Athene. He would probably have regarded
any abstract truth of number or figure (529 E) as higher than
the greatest of them. Yet it is hard to suppose that some in-
fluence, such as he hopes to inspire in youth, did not pass into
his own mind from the works of art which he saw around him.
We are living upon the fragments of them, and find in a few
broken stones the standard of truth and beauty. But in Plato
this feeling has no expression ; he nowhere says that beauty is
the object of art ; he seems to deny that wisdom can take an
external form (Phaedrus, 250 E) ; he does not distinguish the
fine from the mechanical arts. Whether or no, like sortie writers,
he felt more than he expressed, it is at any rate remarkable
that the greatest perfection of the fine arts should coincide
with an almost entire silence about them. In one very striking
passage (iv. 420) he tells us that a work of art, like the State, is
a whole ; and this conception of a whole and the love of the
newly-born mathematical sciences may be regarded, if not as
the inspiring, at any rate as the regulating principles of Greek
art (cp. Xen. Mem. iii. 10. 6 ; and Sophist, 235, 236).

4. Plato makes the true and subtle remark that the physician
had better not be in robust health ; and should have known what
illness is in his own person. But the judge ought to have had no
similar experience of evil ; he is to be a good man who, having
passed his youth in innocence^ became acquainted late in life
with the vices of others. And therefore, according to Plato, a
judge should not be young, just as a young man according to
Aristotle is not fit to be a hearer of moral philosophy. The
bad, on the other hand, have a knowledge of vice, but no know-

e 2

Hi The transposition of ranks.

Republic ledge of virtue. It may be doubted, however, whether this train
In- of reflection is well founded. In a remarkable passage of the

INTRODUC-
TION. Laws (xii. 950 B) it is acknowledged that the evil may form a

correct estimate of the good. The union of gentleness and
courage in Book ii. at first seemed to be a paradox, yet was
afterwards ascertained to be a truth. And Plato might also have
found that the intuition of evil may be consistent with the
abhorrence of it (cp. infra, ix. 582). There is a directness of aim
in virtue which gives an insight into vice. And the knowledge
of character is in some degree a natural sense independent of
any special experience of good or evil.

5. One of the most remarkable conceptions of Plato, because
un-Greek and also very different from anything which existed
at all in his age of the wojld, is the transposition of ranks. In the
Spartan state there had been enfranchisement qf Helots and
degradation of citizens under special circumstances. And in the
ancient Greek aristocracies, merit was certainly recognized as one
of the elements on which government was based. The founders
of states were supposed to be their benefactors, who were raised
by their great actions above the ordinary level of humanity ; at
a later period, the services of warriors and legislators were held to
entitle them and their descendants to the privileges of citizenship
and to the first rank in the state. And although the existence
of an ideal aristocracy is slenderly proven from the remains of
early Greek history, and we have a difficulty in ascribing such
a character, however the idea may be defined, to any actual
Hellenic state — or indeed to any state which has ever existed
in the world — still the rule of the best was certainly the aspira-
tion of philosophers, who probably accommodated a good deal
their views of primitive history to their own notions of good
government. Plato further insists on applying to the guardians
of his state a series of tests by which all those who fell short
of a fixed standard were either removed from the governing
body, or not admitted to it ; and this ' academic ' discipline did
to a certain extent prevail in Greek states, especially in Sparta.
He also indicates that the system of caste, which existed in a
great part of the ancient, and is by no means extinct in the
modern European world, should be set aside from time to time in
favour of merit. He is aware how deeply the greater part of

The power of music. liii

mankind resent any interference with the order of society, and Republic
therefore he proposes his novel idea in the form of what he ,

INTRODUC-

himself calls a * monstrous fiction.' (Compare the ceremony of TION-
preparation for the two ' great waves ' in Book v.) Two principles
are indicated by him : first, that there is a distinction of ranks
dependent on circumstances prior to the individual : second, that
this distinction is and ought to be broken through by personal
qualities. He adapts mythology like the Homeric poems to the
wants of the state, making 'the Phoenician tale' the vehicle
of his ideas. Every Greek state had a myth respecting its own
origin ; the Platonic republic may also have a tale of earthborn
men. The gravity and verisimilitude with which the tale is told,
and the analogy of Greek tradition, are a sufficient verification
of the ' monstrous falsehood.' Ancient poetry had spoken of a
gold and silver and brass and iron age succeeding one another,
but Plato supposes these differences in the natures of men to
exist together in a single state. Mythology supplies a figure
under which the lesson may be taught (as Protagoras says,
* the myth is more interesting '), and also enables Plato to touch
lightly on new principles without going into details. In this
passage he shadows forth a general truth, but he does not tell
us by what steps the transposition of ranks is to be effected.
Indeed throughout the Republic he allows the lower ranks to
fade into the distance. We do not know whether they are to
carry arms, and whether in the fifth book they are or are not
included in the communistic regulations respecting property
and marriage. Nor is there any use in arguing strictly either
from a few chance words, or from the silence of Plato, or
in drawing inferences which were beyond his vision. Aris-
totle, in his criticism on the position of the lower classes, does
not perceive that the poetical creation is 'like the air, invulner-
able,' and cannot be penetrated by the shafts of his logic (Pol. 2,
5, 18 foil.).

6. Two paradoxes which strike the modern reader as in the
highest degree fanciful and ideal, and which suggest to him
many reflections, are to be found in the third book of the Re-
public : first, the great power of music, so much beyond any
influence which is experienced by us in modern times, when
the art or science has been far more developed, and has found

liv Relation of mind and body.

Republic the secret of harmony, as well as of melody ; secondly, the
i TR D indefinite and almost absolute control which the soul is supposed
to exercise over the body.

In the first we suspect some degree of exaggeration, such as
we may also observe among certain masters of the art, not
unknown to us, at the present day. With this natural enthu-
siasm, which is felt by a few only, there seems to mingle in
Plato a sort of Pythagorean reverence for numbers and numerical
proportion to which Aristotle is a stranger. Intervals of sound
and number are to him sacred things which have a law of their
own, not dependent on the variations of sense. They rise above
sense, and become a connecting link with the world of ideas.
But it is evident that Plato is describing what to him appears
to be also a fact. The power of a simple and characteristic
melody on the impressible mind of the Greek is more than
we can easily appreciate. The effect of national airs may bear
some comparison with it. And, besides all this, there is a
confusion between the harmony of musical notes and the har-
mony of soul and body, which is so potently inspired by them.

The second paradox leads up to some curious and in-
teresting questions— How far can the mind control the body?
Is the relation between them one of mutual antagonism or of
mutual harmony ? Are they two or one, and is either of them
the cause of the other ? May we not at times drop the opposition
between them, and the mode of describing them, which is so
familiar to us, arid yet hardly conveys any precise meaning, and try
to view this composite creature, man, in a more simple manner ?
Must we not at any rate admit that there is in human nature a
higher and a lower principle, divided by no distinct line, which at
times break asunder and take up arms against one another ? Or
again, they are reconciled and move together, either unconsciously
in the ordinary work of life, or consciously in the pursuit of some
noble aim, to be attained not without an effort, and for which
every thought and nerve are strained. And then the body be-
comes the good friend or ally, or servant or instrument of the
mind. And the mind has often a wonderful and almost super-
human power of banishing disease and weakness and calling out
a hidden strength. Reason and the desires, the intellect and the
senses are brought into harmony and obedience so as to form a

The management of health. Iv

single human being. They are ever parting, ever meeting ; and Republic
the identity or diversity of their tendencies or operations is for lNTROpUC.
the most part unnoticed by us. When the mind touches the body TION-
through the appetites, we acknowledge the responsibility of the
one to the other. There is a tendency in us which says ' Drink.'
There is another which says, * Do not drink ; it is not good for
you.' And we all of us know which is the rightful superior. We
are also responsible for our health, although into this sphere there
enter some elements of necessity which maybe beyond our control.
Still even in the management of health, care and thought, continued
over many years, may make us almost free agents, if we do not
exact too much of ourselves, and if we acknowledge that all
human freedom is limited by the laws of nature and of mind.

We are disappointed to find that Plato, in the general con-
demnation which he passes on the practice of medicine prevailing
in his own day, depreciates the effects of diet. He would like
to have diseases of a definite character and capable of receiving
a definite treatment. He is afraid of invalidism interfering with
the business of life. He does not recognize that time is the
great healer both of mental and bodily disorders; and that
remedies which are gradual and proceed little by little are safer
than those which produce a sudden catastrophe. Neither -does
he see that there is no way in which the mind can more
surely influence the body than by the control of eating and
drinking; or any other action or occasion of human life on
which the higher freedom of the will can be more simply or
truly asserted.

7. Lesser matters of style may be remarked, (i) The affected
ignorance of music, which is Plato's way of expressing that
he is passing lightly over the subject. (2) The tentative manner
in which here, as in the second book, he proceeds with the
construction of the State. (3) The description of the State some-
times as a reality (389 D ; 416 B), and then again as a work of
imagination only (cp. 534 C ; 592 B) ; these are the arts by which
he sustains the reader's interest. (4) Connecting links (e. g.
408 C with 379), or the preparation (394 D) for the entire ex-
pulsion of the poets in Book x. (5) The companion pictures
of the lover of litigation and the valetudinarian (405), the satirical
jest about the maxim of Phocylides (407), the manner in which

Ivi Analysis 419-422.

Republic the image of the gold and silver citizens is taken up into the

subject (4l6 ^)» and tne argument fr°m the practice of Asclepius
(407), should not escape notice.

ANALYSIS. BOOK IV. Adeimantus said : ' Suppose a person to argue, Step]
Socrates, that you make your citizens miserable, and this by 4I^
their own free-will ; they are the lords of the city, and yet in-
stead of having, like other men, lands and houses and money
of their own, they live as mercenaries and are always mounting
guard.' You may add, I replied, that they receive no pay but 420
only their food, and have no money to spend on a journey or a
mistress. ' Well, and what answer do you give ? ' My answer is,
that our guardians may or may not be the happiest of men,— I
should not be surprised to find in the long-run that they were,
— but this is not the aim of our constitution, which was de-
signed for the good of the whole and not of any one part. If
I went to a sculptor and blamed him for having painted the
eye, which is the noblest feature of the face, not purple but
black, he would reply : ' The eye must be an eye, and you
should look at the statue as a whole.' * Now I can well imagine
a fool's paradise, in which everybody is eating and drinking,
clothed in purple and fine linen, and potters lie on sofas and
have their wheel at hand, that they may work a little when
they please ; and cobblers and all the other classes of a State 421
lose their distinctive character. And a State may get on with-
out cobblers ; but when the guardians degenerate into boon
companions, then the ruin is complete. Remember that we
are not talking of peasants keeping holiday, but of a State in
which every man is expected to do his own work. The hap-
piness resides not in this or that class, but in the State as a
whole. I have another remark to make :— A middle con-
dition is best for artisans; they should have money enough
to buy tools, and not enough to be independent of business.
And will not the same condition be best for our citizens ? If 422
they are poor, they will be mean ; if rich, luxurious and lazy ;
and in neither case contented. ' But then how will our poor
city be able to go to war against an enemy who has money ? '
There may be a difficulty in fighting against one enemy ; against
two there will be none. In the first place, the contest will be

Analysis 422-425. Ivii

carried on by trained warriors against well-to-do citizens : and Republic

IV.

ANALYSIS.

is not a regular athlete an easy match for two stout opponents

at least ? Suppose also, that before engaging we send ambas-
sadors to one of the two cities, saying, ' Silver and gold we
have not ; do you help us and take our share of the spoil ; ' —
who would fight against the lean, wiry dogs, when they might join
with them in preying upon the fatted sheep ? ' But if many states
join their resources, shall we not be in danger ? ' I am amused
to hear you use the word 'state' of any but our own State.

423 They are ' states,' but not ' a state '—many in one. For in every
state there are two hostile nations, rich and poor, which you
may set one against the other. But our State, while she remains
true to her principles, will be in very deed the mightiest of
Hellenic states.

To the size of the state there is no limit but the necessity of
unity ; it must be neither too large nor too small to be one. This
is a matter of secondary importance, like the principle of trans-
position which was intimated in the parable of the earthborn men.
The meaning there implied was that every man should do that
for which he was fitted, and be at one with himself, and then the
whole city would be united. But all these things are secondary,

424 if education, which is the great matter, be duly regarded. When
the wheel has once been set in motion, the speed is always in-
creasing ; and each generation improves upon the preceding,
both in physical and moral qualities. The care of the governors
should be directed to preserve music and gymnastic from inno-
vation ; alter the songs of a country, Damon says, and you will
soon end by altering its laws. The change appears innocent at
first, and begins in play; but the evil soon becomes serious,
working secretly upon the characters of individuals, then upon
social and commercial relations, and lastly upon the institutions

425 of a state ; and there is ruin and confusion everywhere. But if
education remains in the established form, there will be no
danger. A restorative process will be always going on; the
spirit of law and order will raise up what has fallen down. Nor
will any regulations be needed for the lesser matters of life — rules
of deportment or fashions of dress. Like invites like for good
or for evil. Education will correct deficiencies and supply the
power of self-government. Far be it from us to enter into the

Iviii Analysis 425-427.

Republic particulars of legislation ; let the guardians take care of education,

ANALYSIS. anc* e^ucat^on w^ ta^e care of all other things.

But without education they may patch and mend as they please ;
they will make no progress, any more than a patient who thinks
to cure himself by some favourite remedy and will not give up
his luxurious mode of living. If you tell such persons that they 426
must first alter their habits, then they grow angry; they are
charming people. * Charming, — nay, the very reverse.' Evi-
dently these gentlemen are not in your good graces, nor the
state which is like them. And such states there are which first
ordain under penalty of death that no one shall alter the con-
stitution, and then suffer themselves to be flattered into and
out of anything ; and he who indulges them and fawns upon them,
is their leader and saviour. 'Yes, the men are as bad as the
states.' But do you not admire their cleverness ? * Nay, some
of them are stupid enough to believe what the people tell them.'
And when all the world is telling a man that he is six feet
high, and he has no measure, how can he believe anything else ?
But don't get into a passion : to see our statesmen trying their
nostrums, and fancying that they can cut off at a blow the Hydra- 427
like rogueries of mankind, is as good as a play. Minute enact-
ments are superfluous in good states, and are useless in bad
ones.

And now what remains of the work of legislation ? Nothing for
us ; but to Apollo the god of Delphi we leave the ordering of the
greatest of all things— that is to say, religion. Only our ancestral
deity sitting upon the centre and navel of the earth will be trusted
by us if we have any sense, in an affair of such magnitude. No
foreign god shall be supreme in our realms

INTRODUC- Here, as Socrates would say, let us ' reflect on ' (o-KOTrfytf v) what

TION.

has preceded : thus far we have spoken not of the happiness of
the citizens, but only of the well-being of the State. They may be
the happiest of men, but our principal aim in founding the State
was not to make them happy. They were to be guardians, not
holiday-makers. In this pleasant manner is presented to us the
famous question both of ancient and modern philosophy, touching
the relation of duty to happiness, of right to utility.

First duty, then happiness, is the natural order of our moral
ideas. The utilitarian principle is valuable as a corrective of

Happiness and duty. lix

error, and shows to us a side of ethics which is apt to be neglected. Republic
It may be admitted further that right and utility are co-extensive,
and that he who makes the happiness of mankind his object TION-
has one of the highest and noblest motives of human action. But
utility is not the historical basis of morality ; nor the aspect in
which moral and religious ideas commonly occur to the mind.
The greatest happiness of all is, as we believe, the far-off result
of the divine government of the universe. The greatest happiness
of the individual is certainly to be found in a life of virtue and
goodness. But we seem to be more assured of a law of right than
we can be of a divine purpose, that 'all mankind should be
saved ; ' and we infer the one from the other. And the greatest
happiness of the individual may be the reverse of the greatest
happiness in the ordinary sense of the term, and may be realised
in a life of pain, or in a voluntary death. Further, the word
' happiness ' has several ambiguities ; it may mean either pleasure
or an ideal life, happiness subjective or objective, in this world or
in another, of ourselves only or of our neighbours and of all men
everywhere. By the modern founder of Utilitarianism the self-
regarding and disinterested motives of action are included under
the same term, although they are commonly opposed by us as
benevolence and self-love. The word happiness has not the
definiteness or the sacredness of ' truth ' and ' right ' ; it does not
equally appeal to our higher nature, and has not sunk into the
conscience of mankind. It is associated too much with the com-
forts and conveniences of life ; too little with ' the goods of the soul
which we desire for their own sake.' In a great trial, or danger,
or temptation, or in any great and heroic action, it is scarcely
thought of. For these reasons ' the greatest happiness ' principle
is not the true foundation of ethics. But though not the first
principle, it is the second, which is like unto it, and is often of
easier application. For the larger part of human actions are
neither right nor wrong, except in so far as they tend to the
happiness of mankind (cp. Introd. to Gorgias and Philebus).

The same question reappears in politics, where the useful or
expedient seems to claim a larger sphere and to have a greater
authority. For concerning political measures, we chiefly ask :
How will they affect the happiness of mankind ? Yet here too we
may observe that what we term .expediency is merely the law of

Ix Idealism in Politics.

Republic right limited by the conditions of human society. Right and truth
INTR D c are *^e highest aims of government as well as of individuals ; and
TION. we ought not to lose sight of them because we cannot directly
enforce them. They appeal to the better mind of nations ; and
sometimes they are too much for merely temporal interests to
resist. They are the watchwords which all men use in matters of
public policy, as well as in their private dealings ; the peace of
Europe may be said to depend upon them. In the most com-
mercial and utilitarian states of society the power of ideas remains.
And all the higher class of statesmen have in them something of
that idealism which Pericles is said to have gathered from the
teaching of Anaxagoras. They recognise that the true leader of
men must be above the motives of ambition, and that national
character is of greater value than material comfort and prosperity.
And this is the order of thought in Plato ; first, he expects
his citizens to do their duty, and then under favourable circum-
stances, that is to say, in a well-ordered State, their happi-
ness is assured. That he was far from excluding the modern
principle of utility in politics is sufficiently evident from other
passages, in which ' the most beneficial is affirmed to be the most
honourable ' (v. 457 B), and also ' the most sacred ' (v. 458 E).

We may note (i) The manner in which the objection of Adei-
mantus here, as in ii. 357 foil., 363 ; vi. ad init. etc., is designed to
draw out and deepen the argument of Socrates. (2) The con-
ception of a whole as lying at the foundation both of politics and
of art, in the latter supplying the only principle of criticism,
which, under the various names of harmony, symmetry, measure,
proportion, unity, the Greek seems to have applied to works of
art. (3) The requirement that the State should be limited in
size, after the traditional model of a Greek state ; as in the
Politics of Aristotle (vii. 4, etc.), the fact that the cities of Hellas
were small is converted into a principle. (4) The humorous
pictures of the lean dogs and the fatted sheep, of the light active
boxer upsetting two stout gentlemen at least, of the ' charming '
patients who are always making themselves worse ; or again, the
playful assumption that there is no State but our own ; or the
grave irony with which the statesman is excused who believes that
he is six feet high because he is told so, and having nothing to
measure with is to be pardoned for his ignorance— he is too

Analysis 427-430. Ixi

amusing for us to be seriously angry with him. (5) The light and Republic
superficial manner in which religion is passed over when pro- ^
vision has been made for two great principles, — first, that religion TION.
shall be based on the highest conception of the gods (ii. 377 foil.),
secondly, that the true national or Hellenic type shall be main-
tained

Socrates proceeds : But where amid all this is justice ? Son of ANALYSIS.
Ariston, tell me where. Light a candle and search the city, and get
your brother and the rest of our friends to help in seeking for her.
* That won't do,' replied Glaucon, ' you yourself promised to make
the search and talked about the impiety of deserting justice.' Well,
I said, I will lead the way, but do you follow. My notion is, that
our State being perfect will contain all the four virtues — wisdom,

428 courage, temperance, justice. If we eliminate the three first, the
unknown remainder will be justice.

First then, of wisdom : the State which we have called into
being will be wise because politic. And policy is one among
many kinds of skill, — not the skill of the carpenter, or of the
worker in metal, or of the husbandman, but the skill of him who
advises about the interests of the whole State. Of such a kind is

429 the skill of the guardians, who are a small class in number, far
smaller than the blacksmiths ; but in them is concentrated the
wisdom of the State. And if this small ruling dass have wisdom,
then the whole State will be wise.

Our second virtue is courage, which we have no difficulty in
finding in another class — that of soldiers. Courage may be
defined as a sort of salvation — the never-failing salvation of the
opinions which law and education have prescribed concerning
dangers. You know the way in which dyers first prepare the
white ground and then lay on the dye of purple or of any other
colour. Colours dyed in this way become fixed, and no soap or

430 lye will ever wash them out. Now the ground is education, and
the laws are the colours; and if the ground is properly laid,
neither the soap of pleasure nor the lye of pain or fear will ever
wash them out. This power which preserves right opinion about
danger I would ask you to call ' courage,' adding the epithet
'political ' or ' civilized ' in order to distinguish it from mere animal
courage and from a higher courage which may hereafter be
discussed.

Ixii Analysis 431-434.

Republic Two virtues remain ; temperance and justice. More than the
ANALYSIS. Prececu'ng virtues temperance suggests the idea of harmony. 431
Some light is thrown upon the nature of this virtue by the popular
description of a man as ' master of himself '—which has an absurd
sound, because the master is also the servant. The expression
really means that the better principle in a man masters the worse.
There are in cities whole classes — women, slaves and the like —
who correspond to the worse, and a few only to the better ; and in
our State the former class are held under control by the latter.
Now to which of these classes does temperance belong ? * To both
of them.' And our State if any will be the abode of temperance ;
and we were right in describing this virtue as a harmony which
is diffused through the whole, making the dwellers in the city to 432 ,
be of one mind, and attuning the upper and middle and lower
classes like the strings of an instrument, whether you suppose
them to differ in wisdom, strength or wealth.

And now we are hear the spot ; let us draw in and surround the
cover and watch with all our eyes, lest justice should slip away
and escape. Tell me, if you see the thicket move first. * Nay, I
would have you lead.' Well then, offer up a prayer and follow.
The way is dark and difficult ; but we must push on. I begin to
see a track. ' Good news.' Why, Glaucon, our dulness of scent
is quite ludicrous ! While we are straining our eyes into the
distance, justice is tumbling out at our feet. We are as bad as
people looking for a thing which they have in their hands. Have 433
you forgotten our old principle of the division of labour, or of every
man doing his own business, concerning which we spoke at the
foundation of the State— what but this was justice ? Is there any
other virtue remaining which can compete with wisdom and
temperance and courage in the scale of political virtue ? For
* every one having his own ' is the great object of government ; and
the great object of trade is that every man should do his own 434
business. Not that there is much harm in a carpenter trying to
be a cobbler, or a cobbler transforming himself into a carpenter ;
but great evil may arise from the cobbler leaving his last and
turning into a guardian or legislator, or when a single individual
is trainer, warrior, legislator, all in one. And this evil is injustice,
or every man doing another's business. I do not say that as yet
we are in a condition to arrive at a final conclusion. For the

The definition of justice. Ixiii

definition which we believe to hold good in states has still to be Republic

IV
tested by the individual. Having read the large letters we will ANALYSIS.

435 now come back to the small. From the two together a brilliant
light may be struck out. . . .

Socrates proceeds to discover the nature of justice by a method INTRODUC-
of residues. Each of the first three virtues corresponds to one of
the three parts of the soul and one of the three classes in the
State, although the third, temperance, has more of the nature of a
harmony than the first two. If there be a fourth virtue, that can
only be sought for in the relation of the three parts in the soul or
classes in the State to one another. It is obvious and simple, and
for that very reason has not been found out. The modern logician
will be inclined to object that ideas cannot be separated like
chemical substances, but that they run into one another and may
be only different aspects or names of the same thing, and such in
this instance appears to be the case. For the definition here given
of justice is verbally the same as one of the definitions of temper-
ance given by Socrates in the Charmides (162 A), which however
is only provisional, and is afterwards rejected. And so far from
justice remaining over when the other virtues are eliminated, the
justice and temperance of the Republic can with difficulty be
distinguished. Temperance appears to be the virtue of a part
only, and one of three, whereas justice is a universal virtue of the
whole soul. Yet on the other hand temperance is also described
as a sort of harmony, and in this respect is akin to justice. Justice
seems to differ from temperance in degree rather than in kind ;
whereas temperance is the harmony of discordant elements,
justice is the perfect order by which all natures and classes
do their own business, the right man in the right place, the
division and co-operation of all the citizens. Justice, again, is a
more abstract notion than the other virtues, and therefore, from
Plato's point of view, the foundation of them, to which they are
referred and which in idea precedes them. The proposal to
omit temperance is a mere trick of style intended to avoid
monotony (cp. vii. 528).

There is a famous question discussed in one of the earlier
Dialogues of Plato (Protagoras, 329, 330 ; cp. Arist. Nic. Ethics, vi.
13. 6), ' Whether the virtues are one or many ? ' This receives an
answer which is to the effect that there are four cardinal virtues

Ixiv Analysis 435-437.

Republic (now for the first time brought together in ethical philosophy),
INTRODUC- anc* one suPreme °ver the rest, which is not like Aristotle's
TION. conception of universal justice, virtue relative to others, but the
whole of virtue relative to the parts. To this universal conception
of justice or order in the first education and in the moral nature of
man, the still more universal conception of the good in the second
education and in the sphere of speculative knowledge seems to
succeed. Both might be equally described by the terms Maw,'
'order/ 'harmony;' but while the idea of good embraces 'all
time and all existence,' the conception of justice is not extended
beyond man.

ANALYSIS. . . . Socrates is now going to identify the individual and the
State. But first he must prove that there are three parts of the
individual soul. His argument is as follows : — Quantity makes no
difference in quality. The word 'just/ whether applied to the
individual or to the State, has the same meaning. And the term
'justice ' implied that the same three principles in the State and in
the individual were doing their own business. But are they really
three or one ? The question is difficult, and one which can hardly
be solved by the methods which we are now using ; but the truer
and longer way would take up too much of our time. 'The
shorter will satisfy me*' Well then, you would admit that the
qualities of states mean the qualities of the individuals who
compose them? The Scythians and Thracians are passionate,
our own race intellectual, and the Egyptians and Phoenicians 436
covetous, because the individual members of each have such and
such a character ; the difficulty is to determine whether the
several principles are one or three ; whether, that is to say, we
reason with one part of our nature, desire with another, are angry
with another, or whether the whole soul comes into play in each
sort of action. This enquiry, however, requires a very exact
definition of terms. The same thing in the same relation cannot
be affected in two opposite ways. But there is no impossibility in
a man standing still, yet moving his arms, or in a top which
is fixed on one spot going round upon its axis. There is no
necessity to mention all the possible exceptions ; let us pro- 437
visionally assume that opposites cannot do or be or suffer
opposites in the same relation. And to the class of opposites
belong assent and dissent, desire and avoidance. And one form

Analysis 437-441, Ixv

of desire is thirst and hunger : and here arises a new point— Republic

IV.

ANALYSIS.

thirst is thirst of drink, hunger is hunger of food ; not of warm

438 drink or of a particular kind of food, with the single exception of
course that the very fact of our desiring anything implies that it is
good. When relative terms have no attributes, their correlatives
have no attributes ; when they have attributes, their correlatives
also have them. For example, the term 'greater' is simply
relative to ' less,' and knowledge refers to a subject of knowledge.
But on the other hand, a particular knowledge is of a particular
subject. Again, every science has a distinct character, which is
defined by an object ; medicine, for example, is the science of

439 health, although not to be confounded with health. Having cleared
our ideas thus far, let us return to the original instance of thirst,
which has a definite object — drink. Now the thirsty soul may feel
two distinct impulses ; the animal one saying ' Drink ; ' the rational
one, which says * Do not drink.' The two impulses are contradic-
tory ; and therefore we may assume that they spring from distinct
principles in the soul. But is passion a third principle, or akin to
desire ? There is a story of a certain Leontius which throws some,

• light on this question. He was coming up from the Piraeus
outside the north wall, and he passed a spot where there were
dead bodies lying by the executioner. He felt a longing desire to
see them and also an abhorrence of them ; at first he turned away

440 and shut his eyes, then, suddenly tearing them open, he said, —
4 Take your fill, ye wretches, of the fair sight.' Now is there
not here a third principle which is often found to come to the
assistance of reason against desire, but never of desire against
reason ? This is passion or spirit, of the separate existence of
which we may further convince ourselves by putting the following
case : — When a man suffers justly, if he be of a generous nature
he is not indignant at the hardships which he undergoes \
but when he suffers unjustly, his indignation is his great support ;
hunger and thirst cannot tame him ; the spirit within him must;
do or die, until the voice of the shepherd, that is, of reason,
bidding his dog bark no more, is heard within. This shows

441 that passion is the ally of reason. Is passion then the same with
reason ? No, for the former exists in children and brutes ; and
Homer affords a proof of the distinction between them when he
says, ' He smote his breast, and thus rebuked his soul.'

Ixvi Analysis 441-445.

Republic And now, at last, we have reached firm ground, and are able to
ANALYSIS ^GT tnat t^le v^rtues °^ tne State and of the individual are the
same. For wisdom and courage and justice in the State are
severally the wisdom and courage and justice in the individuals
who form the State. Each of the three classes will do the work
of its own class in the State, and each part in the individual soul ;
reason, the superior, and passion, the inferior, will be harmonized 442
by the influence of music and gymnastic. The counsellor and the
warrior, the head and the arm, will act together in the town of
Mansoul, and keep the desires in proper subjection. The courage
of the warrior is that quality which preserves a right opinion
about dangers in spite of pleasures and pains. The wisdom of
the counsellor is that small part of the soul which has authority
and reason. The virtue of temperance is the friendship of the
ruling and the subject principles, both in the State and in the
individual. Of justice we have already spoken ; and the notion
already given of it may be confirmed by common instances.
Will the just state or the just individual steal, lie, commit adultery, 443
or be guilty of impiety to gods and men ? ' No.' And is not the
reason of this that the several principles, whether in the state or
in the individual, do their own business ? And justice is the
quality which makes just men and just states. Moreover, our old
division of labour, which required that there should be one man
for one use, was a dream or anticipation of what was to follow ;
and that dream has now been realized in justice, which begins by
binding together the three chords of the soul, and then acts
harmoniously in every relation of life. And injustice, which is 444
the insubordination and disobedience of the inferior elements in
the soul, is the opposite of justice, and is inharmonious and
unnatural, being to the soul what disease is to the body ; for in the
soul as well as in the body, good or bad actions produce good or
bad habits. And virtue is the health and beauty and well-being of
the soul, and vice is the disease and weakness and deformity of
the soul.

Again the old question returns upon us : Is justice or injustice 445
the more profitable ? The question has become ridiculous. For
injustice, like mortal disease, makes life not worth having. Come
up with me to the hill which overhangs the city and look down
upon the single form of virtue, and the infinite forms of vice,

The laws of contradiction. Ixvii

among which are four special ones, characteristic both of states Republic
and of individuals. And the state which corresponds to the

ANALYSIS.

single form of virtue is that which we have been describing,
wherein reason rules under one of two names — monarchy and
aristocracy. Thus there are five forms in all, both of states and of
souls. . . .

In attempting to prove that the soul has three separate faculties, INTRODUC-
Plato takes occasion to discuss what makes difference of faculties.
And the criterion which he proposes is difference in the working
of the faculties. The same faculty cannot produce contradic-
tory effects. But the path of early reasoners is beset by thorny
entanglements, and he will not proceed a step without first
clearing the ground. This leads him into a tiresome digression,
which is intended to explain the nature of contradiction. First,
the contradiction must be at the same time and in the same
relation. Secondly, no extraneous word must be introduced
into either of the terms in which the contradictory proposition
is expressed : for example, thirst is of drink, not of warm drink.
He implies, what he does not say, that if, by the advice of reason,
or by the impulse of anger, a man is restrained from drinking,
this proves that thirst, or desire under which thirst is included, is
distinct from anger and reason. But suppose that we allow
the term ' thirst ' or ' desire ' to be modified, and say an ' angry
thirst,' or a 'revengeful desire,' then the two spheres of desire
and anger overlap and become confused. This case therefore
has to be excluded. And still there remains an exception to
the rule in the use of the term * good,' which is always implied
in the object of desire. These are the discussions of an age
before logic ; and any one who is wearied by them should re-
member that they are necessary to the clearing up of ideas in
the first development of the human faculties.

The psychology of Plato extends no further than the division
of the soul into the rational, irascible, and concupiscent elements,
which, as far as we know, was first made by him, and has
been retained by Aristotle and succeeding ethical writers. The
chief difficulty in this early analysis of the mind is to define
exactly the place of the irascible faculty (tfv/udf), which may be
variously described under the terms righteous indignation, spirit,
passion. It is the foundation of courage, which includes in Plato

f2

Ixviii Passion and desire.

Republic moral courage, the courage of enduring pain, and of surmounting
INTRODUC- intellectual difficulties, as well as of meeting dangers in war.
TICK. Though irrational, \\ inclines to side with the rational : it cannot
be aroused by punishment when justly inflicted : it sometimes
takes the form of an enthusiasm which sustains a man in the per-
formance of great actions. It is the ' lion heart ' with which the
reason makes a treaty (ix. 589 B). On the other hand it is nega-
tive rather than positive ; it is indignant at wrong or falsehood, but
does not, like Love in the Symposium and Phaedrus, aspire to the
vision of Truth or Good. It is the peremptory military spirit
which prevails in the government of honour. It differs from anger
(opyr)), this latter term having no accessory notion of righteous
indignation. Although Aristotle has retained the word, yet we
may observe that * passion ' (0u/*os) has with him lost its affinity
to the rational and has become indistinguishable from 'anger*
(opyrj). And to this vernacular use Plato himself in the Laws
seems to revert (ix. 836 B), though not always (v. 731 A). By
modern philosophy too, as well as in our ordinary conversation,
the words anger or passion are employed almost exclusively
in a bad sense ; there is no connotation of a just or reasonable
cause by which they are aroused. The feeling of ' righteous in-
dignation ' is too partial and accidental to admit of our regarding
it as a separate virtue or habit. We are tempted also to doubt
whether Plato is right in supposing that an offender, however
justly condemned, could be expected to acknowledge the justice
of his sentence ; this is the spirit of a philosopher or martyr rather
than of a criminal.

We may observe (p. 444 D, E) how nearly Plato approaches
Aristotle's famous thesis, that ' good actions produce good habits.'
The words ' as healthy practices (fWiyflev/iara) produce health, so
do just practices produce justice,' have a sound very like the
Nicomachean Ethics. But we note also that an incidental remark
in Plato has become a far-reaching principle in Aristotle, and an
inseparable part of a great Ethical system.

There is a difficulty in understanding what Plato meant by
* the longer way ' (435 D ; cp. infra, vi. 504) : he seems to intimate
some metaphysic of the future which will not be satisfied with
arguing from the principle of contradiction. In the sixth and
seventh books (compare Sophist and Parmenides) he has given

The longer way. Ixix

us a sketch of such a metaphysic : but when Glaucon asks for Republic

IV.
the final revelation of the idea of good, he is put off with the INTRODUC.

declaration that he has not yet studied the preliminary sciences. TION-
How he would have filled up the sketch, or argued about such
questions from a higher point of view, we can only conjecture.
Perhaps he hoped to find some a priori method of developing
the parts out of the whole ; or he might have asked which of
the ideas contains the other ideas, and possibly have stumbled
on the Hegelian identity of the ' eg6 ' and the ' universal.7 Or
he may have imagined that ideas might be constructed in some
manner analogous to the construction of figures and numbers
in the mathematical sciences. The most certain and necessary
truth was to Plato the universal; and to this he was always
seeking to refer all knowledge or opinion, just as in modern
times we seek to rest them on the opposite pole of induction
and experience. The aspirations of metaphysicians have always
tended to pass beyond the limits of human thought and language :
they seem to have reached a height at which they are ' moving
about in worlds unrealized,' and theft conceptions, although
profoundly affecting their own minds, become invisible or un-
intelligible to others. We are not therefore surprized to find
that Plato himself has nowhere clearly explained his doctrine
of ideas ; or that his school in a later generation, like his con-
temporaries Glaucon and Adeimantus, were unable to follow
him in this region of speculation. In the Sophist, where he is
refuting the scepticism which maintained either that there was no
such thing as predication, or that all might be predicated of all, he
arrives at the conclusion that some ideas combine with some,
but not all with all. But he makes only one or two steps forward
on this path; he nowhere attains to any connected system of
ideas, or even to a knowledge of the most elementary relations
of the sciences to one another (see infra).

Steph. BOOK V. I was going to enumerate the four forms of vice ANALYSIS.
449 or decline in states, when Polemarchus— he was sitting a little
farther from me than Adeimantus— taking him by the coat and
leaning towards him, said something in an undertone, of which
I only caught the words, ' Shall we let him off?' 'Certainly
not,' said Adeimantus, raising his voice* Whom, I said, are you

Ixx Analysis 449-452.

Republic not going to let off? * You,3 he said. Why ? ' Because we think
ANALYSIS ^at ^ou are not Dealing fairly with us in omitting women and
children, of whom you have slily disposed under the general
formula that friends have all things in common.' And was I
not right? 'Yes/ he replied, 'but there are many sorts of
communism or community, and we want to know which of them
is right. The company, as you have just heard, are resolved
to have a further explanation.' Thrasymachus said, * Do you 450
think that we have come hither to dig for gold, or to hear you
discourse ? ' Yes, I said ; but the discourse should be of a reason-
able length. Glaucon added, •' Yes, Socrates, and there is reason
in spending the whole of life in such discussions ; but pray, with-
out more ado, tell us how this community is to be carried out,
and how the interval between birth and education is to be
filled up.' Well, I said, the subject has several difficulties —
What is possible ? is the first question. What is desirable ? is
the second. ' Fear not,' he replied, ' for you are speaking among
friends.' That, I replied, is a sorry consolation ; I shall destroy
my friends as well as myself. Not that I mind a little innocent 45 *
laughter ; but he who kills the truth is a murderer. ' Then,' said
Glaucon, laughing, ' in case you should murder us we will acquit
you beforehand, and you shall be held free from the guilt of
deceiving us.'

• Socrates proceeds : — The guardians of our state are to be
watch-dogs, as we have already said. Now dogs are not divided
into hes and shes — we do not take the masculine gender out
to hunt and leave the females at home to look after their puppies.
They have the same employments — the only difference between
them is that the one sex is stronger and the other weaker. But
if women are to have the same employments as men, they
must have the same education — they must be taught music
and gymnastics, and the art of war. I know that a great joke 452
will be made of their riding on horseback and carrying weapons ;
the sight of the naked old wrinkled women showing their agility
in the palaestra will certainly not be a vision of beauty, and may
be expected to become a famous jest But we must not mind
the wits ; there was a time when they might have laughed at
our present gymnastics. All is habit : people have at last found
out that the exposure is better than the concealment of the

Analysis 452-456. Ixxi

person, and now they laugh no more. Evil only should be the Republic

ANALYSIS.

subject of ridicule.

453 The first question is, whether women are able either wholly or
partially to share in the employments of men. And here we
may be charged with inconsistency in making the proposal at all.
For we started originally with the division of labour ; and the
diversity of employments was based on the difference of natures.
But is there no difference between men and women ? Nay,
are they not wholly different ? There was the difficulty, Glaucon,
which made me unwilling to speak of family relations. However,
when a man is out of his depth, whether in a pool or in an ocean,
he can only swim for his life ; and we must try to find a way of
escape, if we can.

454 The argument is, that different natures have different uses, and
the natures of men and women are said to differ. But this is only
a verbal opposition. We do not consider that the difference
may be purely nominal and accidental ; for example, a bald man
and a hairy man are opposed in a single point of view, but
you cannot infer that because a bald man is a cobbler a hairy
man ought not to be a cobbler. Now why is such an inference
erroneous? Simply because the opposition between them is
partial only, like the difference between a male physician and
a female physician, not running through the whole nature, like the
difference between a physician and a carpenter. And if the
difference of the sexes is only that the one beget and the other
bear children, this does not prove that they ought to have

455 distinct educations. Admitting that women differ from men in
capacity, do not men equally differ from one another? Has
not nature scattered all the qualities which our citizens require
indifferently up and down among the two sexes ? and even in
their peculiar pursuits, are not women often, though in some
cases superior to men, ridiculously enough surpassed by them?
Women are the same in kind as men, and have the same aptitude

456 or want of aptitude for medicine or gymnastic or war, but in a
less degree. One woman will be a good guardian, another not ;
and the good must be chosen to be the colleagues of our
guardians. If however their natures are the same, the inference
is that their education must also be the same ; there is no longer
anything unnatural or impossible in a woman learning music

Ixxii Analysis 456-460.

Republic and gymnastic. And the education which we give them will

ANALYSIS ^e the vei%v ^est, ^T suPer*or to that °f cobblers, and will train
up the very best women, and nothing can be more advantageous to
the State than this. Therefore let them strip, clothed in their 457
chastity, and share in the toils of war and in the defence of their
country ; he who laughs at them is a fool for his pains.

The first wave is past, and the argument is compelled to admit
that men and women have common duties and pursuits. A
second and greater wave is rolling in — community of wives and
children ; is this either expedient or possible ? The expediency
I do not doubt ; I am not so sure of the possibility. ' Nay, I
think that a considerable doubt will be entertained on both
points.' I meant to have escaped the trouble of proving the
first, but as you have detected the little stratagem I must even
submit. Only allow me to feed my fancy like the solitary in his 45 8
walks, with a dream of what might be, and then I will return to
the question of what can be.

In the first place our rulers will enforce the laws and make new
ones where they are wanted, and their allies or ministers will
obey. You, as legislator, have already selected the men ; and
how you shall select the women. After the selection has been
made, they will dwell in common houses and have their meals in
common, and will be brought together by a necessity more certain
than that of mathematics. But they cannot be allowed to live in
licentiousness ; that is an unholy thing, which the rulers are
determined to prevent. For the avoidance of this, holy marriage
festivals will be instituted, and their holiness will be in proportion 459
to their usefulness. And here, Glaucon, I should like to ask (as
I know that you are a breeder of birds and animals), Do you
not take the greatest care in the mating ? * Certainly.' And there
is no reason to suppose that less care is required in the marriage
of human beings. But then our rulers must be skilful physicians
of the State, for they will often need a strong dose of falsehood in
order to bring about desirable unions between their subjects.
The good must be paired with the good, and the bad with the
bad, and the offspring of the one must be reared, and of the other
destroyed ; in this way the flock will be preserved in prime
condition. Hymeneal festivals will be celebrated at times fixed 460
with an eye to population, and the brides and bridegrooms will

Analysis 460-462. Ixxiii

meet at them ; and by an ingenious system of lots the rulers will Republic
contrive that the brave and the fair come together, and that those '

of inferior breed are paired with inferiors — the latter will ascribe
to chance what is really the invention of the rulers. And when
children are born, the offspring of the brave and fair will be
carried to an enclosure in a certain part of the city, and there
attended by suitable nurses ; the rest will be hurried away to
places unknown. The mothers will be brought to the fold and
will suckle the children; care however must be taken that none
of them recognise their own offspring ; and if necessary other
nurses may also be hired. The trouble of watching and getting
up at night will be transferred to attendants. ' Then the wives of
our guardians will have a fine easy time when they are having
children.' And quite right too, I said, that they should.

The parents ought to be in the prime of life, which for a man
may be reckoned at thirty years — from twenty-five, when he

461 has ' passed the point at which the speed of life is greatest,'
to fifty-five ; and at twenty years for a woman — from twenty to
forty. Any one above or below those ages who partakes in
the hymeneals shall be guilty of impiety ; also every one who
forms a marriage connexion at other times without the consent
of the rulers. This latter regulation applies to those who are
within the specified ages, after which they may range at will;
provided they avoid the prohibited degrees of parents and children,
or of brothers and sisters, which last, however, are not absolutely
prohibited, if a dispensation be procured. ' But how shall we
know the degrees of affinity, when all things are common ? '
The answer is, that brothers and sisters are all such as are born
seven or nine months after the espousals, and their parents those

462 who are then espoused, and every one will have many children
and every child many parents.

Socrates proceeds : I have now to prove that this scheme is
advantageous and also consistent with our entire polity. The
greatest good of a State is unity ; the greatest evil, discord and
distraction. And there will be unity where there are no private
pleasures or pains or interests— where if one member suffers
all the members suffer, if one citizen is touched all are quickly
sensitive ; and the least hurt to the little finger of the State runs
through the whole body and vibrates to the soul. For the true

Ixxiv Analysis 462-466.

Republic State, like an individual, is injured as a whole when any part
ANALYSIS *s an<ecte^' Every State has subjects and rulers, who in a 463
democracy are called rulers, and in other States masters : but in
our State they are called saviours and allies; and the subjects
who in other States are termed slaves, are by us termed nurturers
and paymasters, and those who are termed comrades and
colleagues in other places, are by us called fathers and brothers.
And whereas in other States members of the same government
regard one of their colleagues as a friend and another as an
enemy, in our State no man is a stranger to another ; for every
citizen is connected with every other by ties of blood, and these
names and this way of speaking will have a corresponding
reality — brother, father, sister, mother, repeated from infancy in
the ears of children, will not be mere words. Then again the 464
citizens will have all things in common, and having common
property they will have common pleasures and pains.

Can there be strife and contention among those who are of
one mind ; or lawsuits about property when men have nothing
but their bodies which they call their own ; or suits about
violence when every one is bound to defend himself? The
permission to strike when insulted will be an ' antidote ' to 465
the knife and will prevent disturbances in the State. But
no younger man will strike an elder ; reverence will prevent
him from laying hands on his kindred, and he will fear that the
rest of the family may retaliate. Moreover, our citizens will be
rid of the lesser evils of life ; there will be no flattery of the rich,
no sordid household cares, no borrowing and not paying. Com-
pared with the citizens of other States, ours will be Olympic
victors, and crowned with blessings greater still — they and their
children having a better maintenance during life, and after death
an honourable burial. Nor has the happiness of the individual 466
been sacrificed to the happiness of the State (cp. iv. 419 E) ; our
Olympic victor has not been turned into a cobbler, but he has
a happiness beyond that of any cobbler. At the same time, if any
conceited youth begins to dream of appropriating the State to
himself, he must be reminded that ' half is better than the whole.'
' I should certainly advise him to stay where he is when he has the
promise of such a brave life.'
- But is such a community possible ? — as among the animals, so

Analysis 466-469. Ixxv

also among men ; and if possible, in what way possible ? About Republic
war there is no difficulty; the principle of communism is adapted . ^
to military service. Parents will take their children to look on

467 at a battle, just as potters' boys are trained to the business by
looking on at the wheel. And to the parents themselves, as to
other animals, the sight of their young ones will prove a great
incentive to bravery. Young warriors must learn, but they must
not run into danger, although a certain degree of risk is worth
incurring when the benefit is great. The young creatures should
be placed under the care of experienced veterans, and they should
have wings — that is to say, swift and tractable steeds on which

468 they may fly away and escape. One of the first things to be done
is to teach a youth to ride.

Cowards and deserters shall be degraded to the class of
husbandmen ; gentlemen who allow themselves to be taken
prisoners, may be presented to the enemy. But what shall be
done to the hero? First of all he shall be crowned by all the
youths in the army ; secondly, he shall receive the right hand of
fellowship ; and thirdly, do you think that there is any harm in
his being kissed ? We have already determined that he shall
have more wives than others, in order that he may have as many
children as possible. And at a feast he shall have more to eat ;
we have the authority of Homer for honouring brave men with
' long chines,' which is an appropriate compliment, because meat
•is a very strengthening thing. Fill the bowl then, and give the
best seats and meats to the brave — may they do them good !
And he who dies in battle will be at once declared to be of the
golden race, and will, as we believe, become one of Hesiod's

469 guardian angels. He shall be worshipped after death in the
manner prescribed by the oracle ; and not only he, but all other
benefactors of the State who die in any other way, shall be
admitted to the same honours.

The next question is, How shall we treat our enemies ? Shall
Hellenes be enslaved ? No ; for there is too great a risk of the
whole race passing under the yoke of the barbarians. Or shall
the dead be despoiled ? Certainly not ; for that sort of thing is an
excuse for skulking, and has been the ruin of many an army*
There is meanness and feminine malice in making an enemy
of the dead body, when the soul which was the owner has fled —

Ixxvi Analysis 469-473.

Republic like a dog who cannot reach his assailants, and quarrels with the
ANALYSIS stones which are thrown at him instead. Again, the arms of

Hellenes should not be offered up in the temples of the Gods ; they 470
are a pollution, for they are taken from brethren. And on similar
grounds there should be a limit to the devastation of Hellenic
territory — the houses should not be burnt, nor more than the
annual produce carried off. For war is of two kinds, civil and
foreign ; the first of which is properly termed c discord,' and only
the second ' war ; ' and war between Hellenes is in reality civil
War — a quarrel in a family, which is ever to be regarded as
unpatriotic and unnatural, and ought to be prosecuted with a view 47 *
to reconciliation in a true phil-Hellenic spirit, as of those who
would chasten but not utterly enslave. The war is not against
a whole nation who are a friendly multitude of men, women,
and children, but only against a few guilty persons ; when they
are punished peace will be restored. That is the way in which
Hellenes should war against one another — and against barbarians,
as they war against one another now.

' But, my dear Socrates, you are forgetting the main question :
Is such a State possible? I grant all and more than you say
about the blessedness of being one family — fathers, brothers,
mothers, daughters, going out to war together ; but I want to
ascertain the possibility of this ideal State.' You are too un- 472
merciful. The first wave and the second wave I have hardly
escaped, and now you will certainly drown me with the third.
When you see the towering crest of the wave, I expect you to
take pity. * Not a whit.'

Well, then, we were led to form our ideal polity in the search
after justice, and the just man answered to the just State. Is this
ideal at all the worse for being impracticable ? Would the picture
of a perfectly beautiful man be any the worse because no such
man ever lived ? Can any reality come up to the idea ? Nature
Will not allow words to be fully realized ; but if I am to try and 473
realize the ideal of the State in a measure, I think that an
approach may be made to the perfection of which I dream by one
or two, I do not say slight, but possible changes in the present
constitution of States. I would reduce them to a single one — the
great wave, as I call it. Until, then, kings are philosophers, or
philosophers are kings, cities will never cease from ill ; no, nor the

Analysis 473-477. Ixxvii

human race; nor will our ideal polity ever come into being. I know Republic
that this is a hard saying, which few will be able to receive. ANALySIS
* Socrates, all the world will take off his coat and rush upon you

474 with sticks and stones, and therefore I would advise you to
prepare an answer.' You got me into the scrape, I said. * And
I was right,' he replied ; ' however, I will stand by you as a sort
of do-nothing, well-meaning ally.' Having the . help of such a
champion, I will do my best to maintain my position. And first, \
must explain of whom I speak and what sort of natures these are who
are to be philosophers and rulers. As you are a man of pleasure,
you will not have forgotten how indiscriminate lovers are in their
attachments ; they love all, and turn blemishes into beauties. The
snub-nosed youth is said to have a winning grace ; the beak of
another has a royal look; the featureless are faultless; the dark
are manly, the fair angels ; the sickly have a new term of endear-

475 ment invented expressly for them, which is ' honey-pale.' Lovers of
wine and lovers of ambition also desire the objects of their affection
in every form. Now here comes the point : — The philosopher too is
a lover of knowledge in every form ; he has an insatiable curiosity.
' But will curiosity make a philosopher ? Are the lovers of sights,
and sounds, who let out their ears to every chorus at the Dionysiac
festivals, to be called philosophers ? ' They are not true philoso-
phers, but only an imitation. * Then how are we to describe the.
true?'

You would acknowledge the existence of abstract ideas, such as

476 justice, beauty, good, evil, which are severally one, yet in their
various combinations appear to be many. Those who recognize
these realities are philosophers ; whereas the other class hear
sounds and see colours, and understand their use in the arts, but
cannot attain to the true or waking vision of absolute justice or
beauty or truth ; they have not the light of knowledge, but of
opinion, and what they see is a dream only. Perhaps he of
whom we say the last will be angry with us; can we pacify
him without revealing the disorder of his mind ? Suppose
we say that, if he has knowledge we rejoice to hear it, but
knowledge must be of something which is, as ignorance is of

477 something which is not ; and there is a third thing, which both is
and is not, and is matter of opinion only. Opinion and knowledge,
then, having distinct objects, must also be distinct faculties. And

Ixxviii Analysis 477-480.

Republic by faculties I mean powers unseen and distinguishable only by the
ANALYSIS din<erence m tneir objects, as opinion and knowledge differ, since
the one is liable to err, but the other is unerring and is the
mightiest of all our faculties. If being is the object of knowledge,
and not-being of ignorance, and these are the extremes, opinion 478
must lie between them, and may be called darker than the one
and brighter than the other. This intermediate or contingent
matter is and is not at the same time, and partakes both of
existence and of non-existence. Now I would ask my good 479
friend, who denies abstract beauty and justice, and affirms a
many beautiful and a many just, whether everything he sees
is not in some point of view different — the beautiful ugly, the
pious impious, the just unjust ? Is not the double also the half,
and are not heavy and light relative terms which pass into one
another ? Everything is and is not, as in the old riddle — ' A man
and not a man shot and did not shoot a bird and not a bird with a
stone and not a stone.' The mind cannot be fixed on either alterna-
tive; and these ambiguous, intermediate, erring, half-lighted objects,
which have a disorderly movement in the region between being
and not-being, are the proper matter of opinion, as the immutable 480
objects are the proper matter of knowledge. And he who grovels
in the world of sense, and has only this uncertain perception of
things, is not a philosopher, but a lover of opinion only. . . .

TION.

INTRODUC- The fifth book is the new beginning of the Republic, in which
the community of property and of family are first maintained,
and the transition is made to the kingdom of philosophers.
For both of these Plato, after his manner, has been preparing in
some chance words of Book IV (424 A), which fall unperceived on
the reader's mind, as they are supposed at first to have fallen on
the ear of Glaucon and Adeimantus. The ( paradoxes,' as Morgen-
stern terms them, of this book of the Republic will be reserved for
another place ; a few remarks on the style, and some explanations
of difficulties, may be briefly added.

First, there is the image of the waves, which serves for a sort of
scheme or plan of the book. The first wave, the second wave, the
third and greatest wave come rolling in, and we hear the roar of
them. All that can be said of the extravagance of Plato's proposals
is anticipated by himself. Nothing is more admirable than the

The ' table of affinities! Ixxix

hesitation with which he proposes the solemn text, 'Until kings Republic
are philosophers,' &c. ; or the reaction from the sublime to the TRODU
ridiculous, when Glaucon describes the manner in which the new TION-
truth will be received by mankind.

Some defects and difficulties may be noted in the execution of
the communistic plan. Nothing is told us of the application of
communism to the lower classes ; nor is the table of prohibited
degrees capable of being made out. It is quite possible that a
child born at one hymeneal festival may marry one of its own
brothers or sisters, or even one of its parents, at another. Plato is
afraid of incestuous unions, but at the same time he does not wish
to bring before us the fact that the city would be divided into families
of those born seven and nine months after each hymeneal festival.
If it were worth while to argue seriously about such fancies, we
might remark that while all the old affinities are abolished, the
newly prohibited affinity rests not on any natural or rational
principle, but only upon the accident of children having been born
in the same month and year. Nor does he explain how the lots
could be so manipulated by the legislature as to bring together
the fairest and best. The singular expression (460 E) which is
employed to describe the age of five-and-twenty may perhaps
be taken from some poet.

In the delineation of the philosopher, the illustrations of the
nature of philosophy derived from love are more suited to the
apprehension of Glaucon, the Athenian man of pleasure, than to
modern tastes or feelings (cp. V. 474, 475). They are partly facetious,
but also contain a germ of truth. That science is a whole, remains
a true principle of inductive as well as of metaphysical philosophy;
and the love of universal knowledge is still the characteristic of
the philosopher in modern as well as in ancient times.

At the end of the fifth book Plato introduces the figment of con-
tingent matter, which has exercised so great an influence both on
the Ethics and Theology of the modern world, and which occurs
here for the first time in the history of philosophy. He did not
remark that the degrees of knowledge in the subject have nothing
corresponding to them in the object. With him a word must
answer to an idea ; and he could not conceive of an opinion which
was an opinion about nothing. The influence of analogy led him
to invent ' parallels and conjugates ' and to overlook facts. To us

Ixxx Necessary confusion of ideas in Plato.

Republic some of his difficulties are puzzling only from their simplicity ; we
INTRO'DUO ^° not Perce^ve tnat tne answer to them ' is tumbling out at our
TION. feet.' To the mind of early thinkers, the conception of not-being
was dark and mysterious (Sophist, 254 A) ; they did not see that
this terrible apparition which threatened destruction to all know-
ledge was only a logical determination. The common term under
which, through the accidental use of language, two entirely different
ideas were included was another source of confusion. Thus
through the ambiguity of doKclv, </>cuVrai, eotKei/, K.T.X. Plato, at-
tempting to introduce order into the first chaos of human thought,
seems to have confused perception and opinion, and to have
failed to distinguish the contingent from the relative. In the
Theaetetus the first of these difficulties begins to clear up ; in the
Sophist the second ; and for this, as well as for other reasons,
both these dialogues are probably to be regarded as later than the
Republic.

ANALYSIS. BOOK VI. Having determined that the many have no know- Steph.
ledge of true being, and have no clear patterns in their minds of
justice, beauty, truth, and that philosophers have such patterns, we
have now to ask whether they or the many shall be rulers in our
State. But who can doubt that philosophers should be chosen, if
they have the other qualities which are required in a ruler ? For 485
they are lovers of the knowledge of the eternal and of all truth ;
they are 'haters of falsehood ; their meaner desires are absorbed in
the interests of knowledge ; they are spectators of all time and all
existence ; and in the magnificence of their contemplation the life 486
of man is as nothing to them, nor is death fearful. Also they are
of a social, gracious disposition, equally free from cowardice and
arrogance. They learn and remember easily; they have har-
monious, well-regulated minds ; truth flows to them sweetly by
nature. Can the god of Jealousy himself find any fault with such 487
an assemblage of good qualities ?

Here Adeimantus interposes : — ' No man can answer you,
Socrates ; but every man feels that this is owing to his own
deficiency in argument. He is driven from one position to
another, until he has nothing more to say, just as an un-
skilful player at draughts is reduced to his last move by a
more skilled opponent. And yet all the time he may be right-

Analysis 487-490. Ixxxi

He may know, in this very instance, that those who make Republic
philosophy the business of their lives, generally turn out rogues if
they are bad men, and fools if they are good. What do you say ? '
I should say that he is quite right. 'Then how is such an ad-
mission reconcileable with the doctrine that philosophers should
be kings ? '

488 I shall answer you in a parable which will also let you see how
poor a hand I am at the invention of allegories. The relation of
good men to their governments is so peculiar, that in order to
defend them I must take an illustration from the world of fiction.
Conceive the captain of a ship, taller by a head and shoulders than
any of the crew, yet a little deaf, a little blind, and rather ignorant
of the seaman's art. The sailors want to steer, although they »
know nothing of the art ; and they have a theory that it cannot
be learned. If the helm is refused them, they drug the captain's
posset, bind him hand and foot, and take possession of the ship.
He who joins in the mutiny is termed a good pilot and what not ; %
they have no conception that the true pilot must observe the
winds and the stars, and must be their master, whether they like
it or not; — such an one would be called by them fool, prater,

^89 star-gazer. This is my parable ; which I will beg you to interpret
for me to those gentlemen who ask why the philosopher has such
an evil name, and to explain to them that not he, but those who will
not use him, are to blame for his uselessness. The philosopher
should not beg of mankind to be put in authority over them. The
wise man should not seek the rich, as the proverb bids, but every
man, whether rich or poor, must knock at the door of the physician
when he has need of him. Now the pilot is the philosopher — he
whom in the parable they call star-gazer, and the mutinous sailors
are the mob of politicians by whom he is rendered useless. Not
that these are the worst enemies of philosophy, who is far more
dishonoured by her own professing sons when they are corrupted

^90 by the world. Need I recall the original image of the philosopher ?
Did we not say of him just now, that he loved truth and hated
falsehood, and that he could not rest in the multiplicity of pheno-
mena, but was led by a sympathy in his own nature to the
contemplation of the absolute ? All the virtues as well as truth,
who is the leader of them, took up their abode in his soul. But as
you were observing, ii we turn aside to view the reality, we see

g

Ixxxii Analysis 490-493.

Republic that the persons who were thus described, with the exception of a
VI.

ANALYSIS.

small and useless class, are utter rogues.

The point which has to be considered, is the origin of this
corruption in nature. Every one will admit that the philosopher, 491
in our description of him, is a rare being. But what numberless
causes tend to destroy these rare beings ! There is no good
thing which may not be a cause of evil — health, wealth, strength,
rank, and the virtues themselves, when placed under unfavourable
circumstances. For as in the animal or vegetable world the
strongest seeds most need the accompaniment of good air and soil,
so the best of human characters turn out the worst when they fall
upon an unsuitable soil ; whereas weak natures hardly ever do
any considerable good or harm ; they are not the stuff out of which
either great criminals or great heroes are made. The philosopher 492
follows the same analogy : he is either the best or the worst of all
men. Some persons say that the Sophists are the corrupters of
youth ; but is not public opinion the real Sophist who is every-
where present— in those very persons, in the assembly, in the
courts, in the camp, in the applauses and hisses of the theatre re-
echoed by the surrounding hills ? Will not a young man's heart
leap amid these discordant sounds ? and will any education save
him from being carried away by the torrent ? Nor is this all. For
if he will not yield to opinion, there follows the gentle compulsion
of exile or death. What principle of rival Sophists or anybody
else can overcome in such an unequal contest ? Characters there
may be more than human, who are exceptions — God may save a 493
man, but not his own strength. Further, I would have you
consider that the hireling Sophist only gives back to the world
their own opinions ; he is the keeper of the monster, who knows
how to flatter or anger him, and observes the meaning of his
inarticulate grunts. Good is what pleases him, evil what he
dislikes ; truth and beauty are determined only by the taste of the
brute. Such is the Sophist's wisdom, and such is the condition
of those who make public opinion the test of truth, whether in art
or in morals. The curse is laid upon them of being and doing
what it approves, and when they attempt first principles the
failure is ludicrous. Think of all this and ask yourself whether the
world is more likely to be a believer in the unity of the idea, or in
the multiplicity of phenomena. And the world if not a believer

Analysis 494-497. Ixxxiii

194 in the idea cannot be a philosopher, and must therefore be a Republic
persecutor of philosophers. There is another evil : — the world
does not like to lose the gifted nature, and so they flatter the
young [Alcibiades] into a magnificent opinion of his own capacity;
the tall, proper youth begins to expand, and is dreaming of
kingdoms and empires. If at this instant a friend whispers to him,
' Now the gods lighten thee ; thou art a great fool ' and must be
educated— do you think that he will listen ? Or suppose a better^
sort of man who is attracted towards philosophy, will they not

1-95 make Herculean efforts to spoil and corrupt him? Are we not
right in saying that the love of knowledge, no less than riches, may
divert him ? Men of this class [Critias] often become politicians —
they are the authors of great mischief in states, and sometimes
also of great good. And thus philosophy is deserted by her
natural protectors, and others enter in and dishonour her. Vulgar
little minds see the land open and rush from the prisons of the
arts into her temple. A clever mechanic having a soul coarse as
his body, thinks that he will gain caste by becoming her suitor.
For philosophy, even in her fallen estate, has a dignity of her own
— and he, like a bald little blacksmith's apprentice as he is, having
made some money and got out of durance, washes and dresses

196 himself as a bridegroom and marries his master's daughter. What
will be the issue of such marriages ? Will they not be vile and
bastard, devoid of truth and nature ? ' They will.' Small, then, is
the remnant of genuine philosophers ; there may be a few who
are citizens of small states, in which politics are not worth thinking
of, or who have been detained by Theages' bridle of ill health ; for
my own case of the oracular sign is almost unique, and too rare
to be worth mentioning. And these few when they have tasted
the pleasures of philosophy, and have taken a look at that den of
thieves and place of wild beasts, which is human life, will stand
aside from the storm under the shelter of a wall, and try to
preserve their own innocence and to depart in peace. * A great
work, too, will have been accomplished by them.' Great, yes, but
not the greatest ; for man is a social being, and can only attain his
highest development in the society which is best suited to him.

497 Enough, then, of the causes why philosophy has such an evil
name. Another question is, Which of existing states is suited
to her ? Not one of them ; at present she is like some exotic seed

Ixxxiv Analysis 497-499.

Republic which degenerates in a strange soil ; only in her proper state will

ANALYSIS s^e ^e shown to be °f heavenly growth. ' And is her proper state

ours or some other ? ' Ours in all points but one, which was left

undetermined. You may remember our saying that some living

mind or witness of the legislator was needed in states. But we

were afraid to enter upon a subject of such difficulty, and now

the question recurs and has not grown easier : — How may philo-

^sophy be safely studied ? Let us bring her into the light of day,

and make an end of the inquiry.

In the first place, I say boldly that nothing can be worse than
the present mode of study. Persons usually pick up a little 498
philosophy in early youth, and in the intervals of business, but
they never master the real difficulty, which is dialectic. Later,
perhaps, they occasionally go to a lecture on philosophy. Years
advance, and the sun of philosophy, unlike that of Heracleitus,
sets never to rise again. This order of education should be re-
versed; it should begin with gymnastics in youth, and as the
man strengthens, he should increase the gymnastics of his soul.
Then, when active life is over, let him finally return to philosophy.
'You are in earnest, Socrates, but the world will be equally
earnest in withstanding you — no one more than Thrasymachus.'
Do not make a quarrel between Thrasymachus and me, who were
never enemies and are now good friends enough. And I shall do
my best to convince him and all mankind of the truth of my words,
or at any rate to prepare for the future when, in another life, we
may again take part in similar discussions. * That will be a long
time hence/ Not long in comparison with eternity. The many
will probably remain incredulous, for they have never seen the
natural unity of ideas, but only artificial juxtapositions; not
free and generous thoughts, but tricks of controversy and quips
of law ; — a perfect man ruling in a perfect state, even a single 499
one they have not known. And we foresaw that there was no
chance of perfection either in states or individuals until a ne-
cessity was laid upon philosophers — not the rogues, but those
whom we called the useless class — of holding office ; or until
the sons of kings were inspired with a true love of philosophy.
Whether in the infinity of past time there has been, or is in
some distant land, or ever will be hereafter, an ideal such as we
have described, we stoutly maintain that there has been, is, and

Analysis 499-502. Ixxxv

will be such a state whenever the Muse of philosophy rules. Republic

ANALYSIS.

500 Will you say that the world is of another mind ? O, my friend,

do not revile the world ! They will soon change their opinion
if they are gently entreated, and are taught the true nature of the
philosopher. Who can hate a man who loves him ? or be jealous
of one who has no jealousy? Consider, again, that the many
hate not the true but the false philosophers— the pretenders who
force their way in without invitation, and are always speaking
of persons and not of principles, which is unlike the spirit of
philosophy. For the true philosopher despises earthly strife ;
his eye is fixed on the eternal order in accordance with which
he moulds himself into the Divine image (and not himself only,
but other men), and is the creator of the virtues private as well as
public. When mankind see that the happiness of states is only
to be found in that image, will they be angry with us for attempt-
ing to delineate it ? ' Certainly not. But what will be the process

;oi of delineation ? ' The artist will do nothing until he has made
a tabula rasa ; on this he will inscribe the constitution of a state,
glancing often at the divine truth of nature, and from that deriving
the godlike among men, mingling the two elements, rubbing out
and painting in, until there is a perfect harmony or fusion of
the divine and human. But perhaps the world will doubt the
existence of such an artist. What will they doubt? That the
philosopher is a lover of truth, having a nature akin to the best ? —
and if they admit this will they still quarrel with us for making
philosophers our kings ? ' They will be less disposed to quarrel.'

;o2 Let us assume then that they are pacified. Still, a person may
hesitate about the probability of the son of a king being a philo-
sopher. And we do not deny that they are very liable to be
corrupted ; but yet surely in the course of ages there might be
one exception — and one is enough. If one son of a king were
a philosopher, and had obedient citizens, he might bring the ideal
polity into being. Hence we conclude that our laws are not
only the best, but that they are also possible, though not free from
difficulty.

I gained nothing by evading the troublesome questions which
arose concerning women and children. I will be wiser now
and acknowledge that we must go to the bottom of another
question : What is to be the education of our guardians ? It was

Ixxxvi Analysis 503-506.

Republic agreed that they were to be lovers of their country, and were 503
ANALY* to ^e testec^ m tne refiner's fire of pleasures and pains, and those
who came forth pure and remained fixed in their principles were
to have honours and rewards in life and after death. But at this
point, the argument put on her veil and turned into another path.
I hesitated to make the assertion which I now hazard, — that our
guardians must be philosophers. You remember all the contra-
dictory elements, which met in the philosopher— how difficult to
find them all in a single person ! Intelligence and spirit are not
often combined with steadiness; the stolid, fearless, nature is
averse to intellectual toil. And yet these opposite elements are
all necessary, and therefore, as we were saying before, the
aspirant must be tested in pleasures and dangers ; and also, as
we must now further add, in the highest branches of knowledge. 504
You will remember, that when we spoke of the virtues mention
was made of a longer road, which you were satisfied to leave
unexplored. 'Enough seemed to have been said.' Enough, my
friend ; but what is enough while anything remains wanting ?
Of all men the guardian must not faint in the search after truth ;
he must be prepared to take the longer road, or he will never
reach that higher region which is above the four virtues ; and of
the virtues too he must not only get an outline, but a clear and
distinct vision. (Strange that we should be so precise about
trifles, so careless about the highest truths!) 'And what are
the highest ? ' You to pretend unconsciousness, when you have 505
so often heard me speak of the idea of good, about which we
know so little, and without which though a man gain the world
he has no profit of it ! Some people imagine that the good is
wisdom ; but this involves a circle, — the good, they say, is wisdom,
wisdom has to do with the good. According to others the good is
pleasure ; but then comes the absurdity that good is bad, for there
are bad pleasures as well as good. Again, the good must have
reality ; a man may desire the appearance of virtue, but he will
not desire the appearance of good. Ought our guardians then
to be ignorant of this supreme principle, of which every man 506
has a presentiment, and without which no man has any real
knowledge of anything? 'But, Socrates, what is this supreme
principle, knowledge or pleasure, or what? You may think me
troublesome, but I say that you have no business to be always

Analysis 506-509. Ixxxvii

repeating the doctrines of others instead of giving us your own.' Republic
Can I say what I do not know? 'You may offer an opinion.'

ANALYSIS.

And will the blindness and crookedness of opinion content you
when you might have the light and certainty of science ? ' I will
only ask you to give such an explanation of the good as you have
given already of temperance and justice.' I wish that I could, but
in my present mood I cannot reach to the height of the knowledge

507 of the good. To the parent or principal I cannot introduce you,
but to the child begotten in his image, which I may compare with
the interest on the principal, I will. (Audit the account, and do
not let me give you a false statement of the debt.) You remember
our old distinction of the many beautiful and the one beautiful,
the particular and the universal, the objects of sight and the
objects of thought? Did you ever consider that the objects of
sight imply a faculty of sight which is the most complex and
costly of our senses, requiring not only objects of sense, but also
a medium, which is light ; without which the sight will not distin-

508 guish between colours and all will be a blank ? For light is
the noble bond between the perceiving faculty and the thing
perceived, and the god who gives us light is the sun, who is
the eye of the .day, but is not to be confounded with the eye
of man. This eye of the day or sun is what I call the child
of the good, standing in the same relation to the visible world
as the good to the intellectual. When the sun shines the eye
sees, and in the intellectual world where truth is, there is sight
and light. Now that which is the sun of intelligent natures,
is the idea of good, the cause of knowledge and truth, yet

509 other and fairer than they are, and standing in the same relation
to them in which the sun stands to light. O inconceivable
height of beauty, which is above knowledge and above truth !
('You cannot surely mean pleasure,' he said. Peace, I replied.)
And this idea of good, like the sun, is also the cause of growth,
and the author not of knowledge only, but of being, yet greater
far than either in dignity and power. ' That is a reach of thought
more than human ; but, pray, go on with the image, for I suspect
that there is more behind.' There is, I said ; and bearing in mind
our two suns or principles, imagine further their corresponding
worlds — one of the visible, the other of the intelligible ; you may
assist your fancy by figuring the distinction under the image

Ixxxviii Analysis 509-511.

Republic of a line divided into two unequal parts, and may again subdivide
ANA ' each part into two lesser segments representative of the stages of
knowledge in either sphere. The lower portion of the lower or
visible sphere will consist of shadows and reflections, and its 510
upper and smaller portion will contain real objects in the world
of nature or of art. The sphere of the intelligible will also
have two divisions,— one of mathematics, in which there is no
ascent but all is descent ; no inquiring into premises, but only
drawing of inferences. In this division the mind works with
figures and numbers, the images of which are taken not from
the shadows, but from the objects, although the truth of them is
seen only with the mind's eye ; and they are used as hypotheses
without being analysed. Whereas in the other division reason 511
uses the hypotheses as stages or steps in the ascent to the idea of
good, to which she fastens them, and then again descends, walking
firmly in the region of ideas, and of ideas only, in her ascent as
well as descent, and finally resting in them,. 'I partly under-
stand,' he replied ; ' you mean that the ideas of science are
superior to the hypothetical, metaphorical conceptions of geometry
and the other arts or sciences, whichever is to be the name of
them ; and the latter conceptions you refuse to make subjects of
pure intellect, because they have no first principle, although when
resting on a first principle, they pass into the higher sphere.'
You understand me very well, I said. And now to those four
divisions of knowledge you may assign four corresponding
faculties — pure intelligence to the highest sphere ; active intelli-
gence to the second ; to the third, faith ; to the fourth, the
perception of shadows — and the clearness of the several faculties
will be in the same ratio as the truth of the objects to which they
are related

INTRODUC- Like Socrates, we may recapitulate the virtues of the philo-
sopher. In language which seems to reach beyond the horizon
of that age and country, he is described as * the spectator of all
time and all existence.' He has the noblest gifts of nature, and
makes the highest use of them. All his desires are absorbed
in the love of wisdom, which is the love of truth. None of the
graces of a beautiful soul are wanting in him ; neither can he
fear death, or think much of human life. The ideal of modern

Portrait of the Philosopher, Ixxxix

times hardly retains the simplicity of the antique ; there is not the Republic
same originality either in truth or error which characterized the INTBOD'UC.
Greeks. The philosopher is no longer living in the unseen, nor TION-
is he sent by an oracle to convince mankind of ignorance ; nor
does he regard knowledge as a system of ideas leading upwards
by regular stages to the idea of good. The eagerness of the
pursuit has abated ; there is more division of labour and less of
comprehensive reflection upon nature and human life as a whole ;
more of exact observation and less of anticipation and inspiration.
Still, in the altered conditions of knowledge, the parallel is not
wholly lost ; and there may be a use in translating the conception
of Plato into the language of our own age. The philosopher in
modern times is one who fixes his mind on the laws of nature in
their sequence and connexion, not on fragments or pictures of
nature ; on history, not on controversy; on the truths which are
acknowledged by the few, not on the opinions of the many. He is
aware of the importance of ' classifying according to nature,' and
will try to ' separate the limbs of science without breaking them '
(Phaedr. 265 E). There is no part of truth, whether great or
small, which he will dishonour ; and in the least things he will
discern the greatest (Parmen. 130 C). Like the ancient philoso-
pher he sees the world pervaded by analogies, but he can also
tell 'why in some cases a single instance is sufficient for an
induction ' (Mill's Logic, 3, 3, 3), while in other cases a thousand
examples would prove nothing. He inquires into a portion of
knowledge only, because the whole has grown too vast to be
embraced by a single mind or life. He has a clearer concep-
tion of the divisions of science and of their relation to the mind
of man than was possible to the ancients. Like Plato, he has a
vision of the unity of knowledge, not as the beginning of philo-
sophy to be attained by a study of elementary mathematics, but
as the far-off result of the working of many minds in many ages.
He is aware that mathematical studies are preliminary to almost
every other ; at the same time, he will not reduce all varieties of
knowledge to the type of mathematics. He too must have a
nobility of character, without which genius loses the better half
of greatness. Regarding the world as a point in immensity, and
each individual as a link in a never-ending chain of existence, he
will not think much of his own life, or be greatly afraid of death.

xc The Criticism of Adeimantus.

Republic Adeimantus objects first of all to the form of the Socratic
INTRODUC- reasonmg> thus showing that Plato is aware of the imperfection
TION. Of his own method. He brings the accusation against himself
which might be brought against him by a modern logician— that
he extracts the answer because he knows how to put the ques-
tion. In a long argument words are apt to change their meaning
slightly, or premises may be assumed or conclusions inferred with
rather too much certainty or universality; the variation at each
step may be unobserved, and yet at last the divergence becomes
considerable. Hence the failure of attempts to apply arithmetical
or algebraic formulae to logic. The imperfection, or rather the
higher and more elastic nature of language, does not allow words
to have the precision of numbers or of symbols. And this quality
in language impairs the force of an argument which has many
steps.

The objection, though fairly met by Socrates in this particular
instance, may be regarded as implying a reflection upon the
Socratic mode of reasoning. And here, as at p. 506 B, Plato
seems to intimate that the time had come when the negative
and interrogative method of Socrates must be superseded by a
positive and constructive one, of which examples are given in
some of the later dialogues. Adeimantus further argues that the
ideal is wholly at variance with facts ; for experience proves
philosophers to be either useless or rogues. Contrary to all
expectation (cp. p. 497 for a similar surprise) Socrates has no
hesitation in admitting the truth of this, and explains the anomaly
in an allegory, first characteristically depreciating his own in-
ventive powers. In this allegory the people are distinguished
from the professional politicians, and, as at pp. 499, 500, are
spoken of in a tone of pity rather than of censure under the
image of 'the noble captain who is not very quick in his per-
ceptions.'

The uselessness of philosophers is explained by the circum-
stance that mankind will not use them. The world in all ages
has been divided between contempt and fear of those who employ
the power of ideas and know no other weapons. Concerning the
false philosopher, Socrates argues that the best is most liable to
corruption ; and that the finer nature is more likely to suffer
from alien conditions. We too observe that there are some kinds

The paradoxical reply of Socrates. xci

of excellence which spring from a peculiar delicacy of consti- Republic
tution ; as is evidently true of the poetical and imaginative tern-
perament, which often seems to depend on impressions, and
hence can only breathe or live in a certain atmosphere. The
man of genius has greater pains and greater pleasures, greater
powers and greater weaknesses, and often a greater play of
character than is to be found in ordinary men. He can assume
the disguise of virtue or disinterestedness without having them,
or veil personal enmity in the language of patriotism and philo-
sophy,—he can say the word which all men are thinking, he has
an insight which is terrible into the follies and weaknesses of his
fellow-men. An Alcibiades, a Mirabeau, or a Napoleon the
First, are born either to be the authors of great evils in states,
or * of great good, when they are drawn in that direction.'

Yet the thesis, ' corruptio optimi pessima,' cannot be maintained
generally or without regard to the kind of excellence which is
corrupted. The alien conditions which are corrupting to one
nature, may be the elements of culture to another. In general
a man can only receive his highest development in a congenial
state or family, among friends or fellow-workers. But also he
may sometimes be stirred by adverse circumstances to such a
degree that he rises up against them and reforms them. And
while weaker or coarser characters will extract good out of evil,
say in a corrupt state of the church or of society, and live on
happily, allowing the evil to remain, the finer or stronger natures
may be crushed or spoiled by surrounding influences — may be-
come misanthrope and philanthrope by turns ; or in a few
instances, like the founders of the monastic orders, or the Re-
formers, owing to some peculiarity in themselves or in their age,
may break away entirely from the world and from the church,
sometimes into great good, sometimes into great evil, sometimes
into both. And the same holds in the lesser sphere of a convent,
a school, a family.

Plato would have us consider how easily the best natures are
overpowered by public opinion, and what efforts the rest of man-
kind will make to get possession of them. The world, the
church, their own profession, any political or party organization,
are always carrying them off their legs and teaching them to
apply high and holy names to their own prejudices and interests.

xcu The better mind of the many.

Republic The 'monster' corporation to which they belong judges right
and truth to be the pleasure of the community. The individual

INTRODUC-
TION, becomes one with his order ; or, if he resists, the world is too

much for him, and will sooner or later be revenged on him.
This is, perhaps, a one-sided but not wholly untrue picture of the
maxims and practice of mankind when they 'sit down together
at an assembly,' either in ancient or modern times.

When the higher natures are corrupted by politics, the lower
take possession of the vacant place of philosophy. This is de-
scribed in one of those continuous images in which the argument,
to use a Platonic expression, ' veils herself,' and which is dropped
and reappears at intervals. The question is asked, — Why are
the citizens of states so hostile to philosophy ? The answer is,
that they do not know her. And. yet there is also a better mind
of the many; they would believe if they were taught. But
hitherto they have only known a conventional imitation of philo-
sophy, words without thoughts, systems which have no life in
them ; a [divine] person uttering the words of beauty and free-
dom, the friend of man holding communion with the Eternal,
and seeking to frame the state in that image, they have never
known. The same double feeling respecting the mass of man*
kind has always existed among men. The first thought is that
the people are the enemies of truth and right ; the second, that
this only arises out of an accidental error and confusion, and that
they do not really hate those who love them, if they could be
educated to know them.

In the latter part of the sixth book, three questions have to be
considered : ist, the nature of the longer and more circuitous
way, which is contrasted with the shorter and more imperfect
method of Book IV; and, the heavenly pattern or idea of the
state ; 3rd, the relation of the divisions of knowledge to one
another and to the corresponding faculties of the soul.

i. Of the higher method of knowledge in Plato we have only a
glimpse. Neither here nor in the Phaedrus or Symposium, nor
yet in the Philebus or Sophist, does he give any clear explanation
of his meaning. He would probably have described his method
as proceeding by regular steps to a system of universal know-
ledge, which inferred the parts from the whole rather than the
whole from the parts. This ideal logic is not practised by him

The better and longer way. xciii

in the search after justice, or in the analysis of the parts of the Republic
soul ; there, like Aristotle in the Nicomachean Ethics, he argues
from experience and the common use of language. But at the
end of the sixth book he conceives another and more perfect
method, in which all ideas are only steps or grades or moments
of thought, forming a connected whole which is self-supporting,
and in which consistency is the test of truth. He does not
explain to us in detail the nature of the process. Like many
other thinkers both in ancient and modern times his mind seems
to be filled with a vacant form which he is unable to realize. He
supposes the sciences to have a natural order and connexion in
an age when they can hardly be said to exist. He is hastening
on to the ' end of the intellectual world ' without even making a
beginning of them.

In modern times we hardly need to be reminded that the
process of acquiring knowledge is here confused with the con-
templation of absolute knowledge. In all science a priori and
a posteriori truths mingle in various proportions. The a priori
part is that which is derived from the most universal experience
of men, or is universally accepted by them ; the a posteriori is
that which grows up around the more general principles and
becomes imperceptibly one with them. But Plato erroneously
imagines that the synthesis is separable from the analysis, and
that the method of science can anticipate science. In entertaining
such a vision of a priori knowledge he is sufficiently justified,
or at least his meaning may be sufficiently explained by the
similar attempts of Descartes, Kant, Hegel, and even of Bacon
himself, in modern philosophy. Anticipations or divinations, or
prophetic glimpses of truths whether concerning man or nature,
seem to stand in the same relation to ancient philosophy which
hypotheses bear to modern inductive science. These ( guesses
at truth ' were not made at random ; they arose from a superficial
impression of uniformities and first principles in nature which
the genius of the Greek, contemplating the expanse of heaven and
earth, seemed to recognize in the distance. Nor can we deny
that in ancient times knowledge must have stood still, and the
human mind been deprived of the very instruments of thought,
if philosophy had been strictly confined to the results of ex-
perience.

xciv The confusion of ideas and numbers.

Republic 2. Plato supposes that when the tablet has been made blank the
artist will fill in the lineaments of the ideal state. Is this a pattern

INTRODUC-
TION, laid up in heaven, or mere vacancy on which he is supposed to

gaze with wondering eye? The answer is, that such ideals are
framed partly by the omission of particulars, partly by imagina-
tion perfecting the form which experience supplies (Phaedo, 74).
Plato represents these ideals in a figure as belonging to another
world ; and in modern times the idea will sometimes seem to
precede, at other times to co-operate with the hand of the artist.
As in science, so also in creative art, there is a synthetical as well
as an analytical method. One man will have the whole in his
mind before he begins; to another the processes of mind and
hand will be simultaneous.

3. There is no difficulty in seeing that Plato's divisions of
knowledge are based, first, on the fundamental antithesis of
sensible and intellectual which pervades the whole pre-Socratic
philosophy ; in which is implied also the opposition of the per-
manent and transient, of the universal and particular. But the
age of philosophy in which he lived seemed to require a further
distinction ; — numbers and figures were beginning to separate
from ideas. The world could no longer regard justice as a cube,
and was learning to see, though imperfectly, that the abstractions
of sense were distinct from the abstractions of mind. Between
the Eleatic being or essence and the shadows of phenomena,
the Pythagorean principle of number found a place, and was,
as Aristotle remarks, a conducting medium from one to the other.
Hence Plato is led to introduce a third term which had not
hitherto entered into the scheme of his philosophy. He had ob-
served the use of mathematics in education ; they were the best
preparation for higher studies. The subjective relation between
them further suggested an objective one; although the passage
from one to the other is really imaginary (Metaph. i, 6, 4). For
metaphysical and moral philosophy has no connexion with mathe-
matics ; number and figure are the abstractions of time and space,
not the expressions of purely intellectual conceptions. When
divested of metaphor, a straight line or a square has no more
to do with right and justice than a crooked line with vice. The
figurative association was mistaken for a real one ; and thus the
three latter divisions of the Platonic proportion were constructed.

The correlation of the faculties. xcv

There is more difficulty in comprehending how he arrived at Republic
the first term of the series, which is nowhere else mentioned, INTROOUC
and has no reference to any other part of his system. Nor indeed TION-
does the relation of shadows to objects correspond to the relation
of numbers to ideas. Probably Plato has been led by the love
of analogy (cp. Timaeus, p. 32 B) to make four terms instead of
three, although the objects perceived in both divisions of the
lower sphere are equally objects of sense. He is also preparing
the way, as his manner is, for the shadows of images at the begin-
ning of the seventh book, and the imitation of an imitation in
the tenth. The line may be regarded as reaching from unity
to infinity, and is divided into two unequal parts, and subdivided
into two more; each lower sphere is the multiplication of the
preceding. Of the four faculties, faith in the lower division has an
intermediate position (cp. for the use of the word faith or belief,
Tn'o-ris, Timaeus, 29 C, 37 B), contrasting equally with the vagueness
of the perception of shadows (ei/cao-t'a) and the higher certainty of
understanding (dtavoia) and reason (i/ous).

The difference between understanding and mind or reason
(vovs) is analogous to the difference between acquiring know-
ledge in the parts and the contemplation of the whole. True
knowledge is a whole, and is at rest ; consistency and universality
are the tests of truth. To this self-evidencing knowledge of the
whole the faculty of mind is supposed to correspond. But there
is a knowledge of the understanding which is incomplete and
in motion always, because unable to rest in the subordinate ideas.
Those ideas are called both images and hypotheses — images
because they are clothed in sense, hypotheses because they are
assumptions only, until they are brought into connexion with the
idea of good.

The general meaning of the passage 508-511, so far as the
thought contained in it admits of being translated into the terms of
modern philosophy, may be described or explained as follows : —
There is a truth, one and self-existent, to which by the help of
a ladder let down from above, the human intelligence may ascend.
This unity is like the sun in the heavens, the light by which
all things are seen, the being by which they are created and
sustained. It is the idea of good. And the steps of the ladder
leading up to this highest or universal existence are the mathe-

xcvi The idea of good, etc.

Republic matical sciences, which also contain in themselves an element

INTRODUC- °^ ^ universal. These, too, we see in a new manner when we

no*, connect them with the idea of good. They then cease to be

hypotheses or pictures, and become essential parts of a higher

truth which is at once their first principle and their final cause.

We cannot give any more precise meaning to this remarkable
passage, but we may trace in it several rudiments or vestiges
of thought which are common to us and to Plato : such as (i) the
unity and correlation of the sciences, or rather of science, for in
Plato's time they were not yet parted off or distinguished ; (2) the
existence of a Divine Power, or life or idea or cause or reason,
not yet conceived or no longer conceived as in the Timaeus and
elsewhere under the form of a person ; (3) the recognition of
the hypothetical and conditional character of the mathematical
sciences, and in a measure of every science when isolated from
the rest; (4) the conviction of a truth which is invisible, and
of a law, though hardly a law of nature, which permeates the
intellectual rather than the visible world.

The method of Socrates is hesitating and tentative, awaiting the
fuller explanation of the idea of good, and of the nature of dialectic
in the seventh book. The imperfect intelligence of Glaucon, and
the reluctance of Socrates to make a beginning, mark the difficulty
of the subject. The allusion to Theages' bridle, and to the
internal oracle, or demonic sign, of Socrates, which here, as
always in Plato, is only prohibitory ; the remark that the salva-
tion of any remnant of good in the present evil state of the
world is due to God only; the reference to a future state of
existence, 498 D, which is unknown to Glaucon in the tenth
book, 608 D, and in which the discussions of Socrates and his
disciples would be resumed ; the surprise in the answers at 487 E
and 497 B ; the fanciful irony of Socrates, where he pretends
that he can only describe the strange position of the philo-
sopher in a figure of speech ; the original observation that the
Sophists, after all, are only the representatives and not the
leaders of public opinion ; the picture of the philosopher standing
aside in the shower of sleet under a wall; the figure of 'the
great beast ' followed by the expression of good-will towards the
common people who would not have rejected the philosopher
if they had known him ; the 'right noble thought' that the highest

The Idea of Good. xcvii

truths demand the greatest exactness ; the hesitation of Socrates Republic
in returning once more to his well-worn theme of the idea of

t • INTRODUC-

good ; the ludicrous earnestness of Glaucon ; the comparison of «ON.
philosophy to a deserted maiden who marries beneath her — are
some of the most interesting characteristics of the sixth book.

Yet a few more words may be added, on the old theme, which
was so oft discussed in the Socratic circle, of which we, like
Glaucon and Adeimantus, would fain, if possible, have a clearer
notion. Like them, we are dissatisfied when we are told that
the idea of good can only be revealed to a student of the mathe-
matical sciences, and we are inclined to think that neither we
nor they could have been led along that path to any satisfactory
goal. For we have learned that differences of quantity cannot
pass into differences of quality, and that the mathematical sciences
can never rise above themselves into the sphere of our higher
thoughts, although they may sometimes furnish symbols and
expressions of them, and may train the mind in habits of abstrac-
tion and self-concentration. The illusion which was natural to
an ancient philosopher has ceased to be an illusion to us. But
if the process by which we are supposed to arrive at the idea
of good be really imaginary, may not the idea itself be also a
mere abstraction? We remark, first, that in all ages, and
especially in primitive philosophy, words such as being, essence,
unity, good, have exerted an extraordinary influence over the
minds of men. The meagreness or negativeness of their content
has been in an inverse ratio to their power. They have become
the forms under which all things were comprehended. There
was a need or instinct in the human soul which they satisfied;
they were not ideas, but gods, and to this new mythology the men
of a later generation began to attach the powers and associations
of the elder deities.

The idea of good is one of those sacred words or forms of
thought, which were beginning to take the place of the old
mythology. It meant unity, in which all time and all existence
were gathered up. It was the truth of all things, and also the light
in which they shone forth, and became evident to intelligences
human and divine. It was the cause of all things, the power by
which they were brought into being. It was the universal reason
divested of a human personality. It was the life as well as the

h

xcviii The Idea of Good.

Republic light of the world, all knowledge and all power were compre-

INTR<>DUC Bended *n **• The way to ^ was through the mathematical

"ON. sciences, and these too were dependent on it. To ask whether

God was the maker of it, or made by it, would be like asking

whether God could be conceived apart from goodness, or goodness

apart from God. The God of the Timaeus is not really at variance

with the idea of good ; they are aspects of the same, differing

only as the personal from the impersonal, or the masculine from

the neuter, the one being the expression or language of mythology,

the other of philosophy.

This, or something like this, is the meaning of the idea of good
as conceived by Plato. Ideas of number, order, harmony, de-
velopment may also be said to enter into it. The paraphrase
which has just been given of it goes beyond the actual words of
Plato. We have perhaps arrived at the stage of philosophy which
enables us to understand what he is aiming at, better than he did
himself. We are beginning to realize what he saw darkly and
at a distance. But if he could have been told that this, or some
conception of the same kind, but higher than this, was the truth
at which he was aiming, and the need which he sought to supply,
he would gladly have recognized that more was contained in his
own thoughts than he himself knew. As his words are few and
his manner reticent and tentative, so must the style of his inter-
preter be. We should not approach his meaning more nearly
by attempting to define it further. In translating him into the
language of modern thought, we might insensibly lose the spirit
of ancient philosophy. It is remarkable that although Plato
speaks of the idea of good as the first principle of truth and
being, it is nowhere mentioned in his writings except in this
passage. Nor did it retain any hold upon the minds of his
disciples in a later generation ; it was probably unintelligible to
them. Nor does the mention of it in Aristotle appear to have
any reference to this or any other passage in his extant writings.

ANALYSIS. BOOK VII. And now I will describe in a figure the Steph.
enlightenment or unenlightenment of our nature : — Imagine *
human beings living in an underground den which is open
towards the light ; they have been there from childhood, hav-
ing their necks and legs chained, and can only see into the den.

Analysis 514-517. xcix

At a distance there is a fire, and between the fire and the Republic

VII
prisoners a raised way, and a low wall is built along the way, ANALVS'JS

like the screen over which marionette players show their
515 puppets. Behind the wall appear moving figures, who hold in
their hands various works of art, and among them images of
men and animals, wood and stone, and some of the passers-by
are talking and others silent. ' A strange parable,' he said, ' and
strange captives.' They are ourselves, I replied ; and they see
only the shadows of the images which the fire throws on the wall
of the den ; to these they give names, and if we add an echo which
returns from the wall, the voices of the passengers will seem
to proceed from the shadows. Suppose now that you suddenly
turn them round and make them look with pain and grief to them-
selves at the real images; will they believe them to be real.?
Will not their eyes be dazzled, and will they not try to get away
from the light to something which they are able to behold without

516 blinking ? And suppose further, that they are dragged up a steep
and rugged ascent into the presence of the sun himself, will not
their sight be darkened with the excess of light ? Some time will
pass before they get the habit of perceiving at all ; and at first
they will be able to perceive only shadows and reflections in the
water ; then they will recognize the moon and the stars, and will
at length behold the sun in his own proper place as he is. Last
of all they will conclude : — This is he who gives us the year and
the seasons, and is the author of all that we see. How will they
rejoice in passing from darkness to light ! How worthless to
them will seem the honours and glories of the den ! But now
imagine further, that they descend into their old habitations ; —
in that underground dwelling they will not see as well as their

517 fellows, and will not be able to compete with them in the measure-
ment of the shadows on the wall ; there will be many jokes about
the man who went on a visit to the sun and lost his eyes, and
if they find anybody trying to set free and enlighten one of their
number, they will put him to death, if they can catch him. Now-
the cave or den is the world of sight, the fire is the sun, the way
upwards is the way to knowledge, and in the world of knowledge
the idea of good is last seen and with difficulty, but when seen

. is inferred to be the author of good and right — parent of the lord
of light in this world, and of truth and understanding in the other.

ha

: Analysis 517-520.

Republic He who attains to the beatific vision is always going upwards ;

ANALYSIS.

he is unwilling to descend into political assemblies and courts

of law ; for his eyes are apt to blink at the images or shadows
of images which they behold in them — he cannot enter into the
ideas of those who have never in their lives understood the
relation of the shadow to the substance. But blindness is of 518
two kinds, and may be caused either by passing out of darkness
into light or out of light into darkness, and a man of sense
will distinguish between them, and will not laugh equally at
both of them, but the blindness which arises from fulness of
light he will deem blessed, and pity the other; or if he laugh
at the puzzled soul looking at the sun, he will have more reason to
laugh than the inhabitants of the den at those who descend from
above. There is a further lesson taught by this parable of ours.
Some persons fancy that instruction is like giving eyes to the
blind, but we say that the faculty of sight was always there,
and that the soul only requires to be turned round towards the
light. And this is conversion ; other virtues are almost like bodily
habits, and may be acquired in the same manner, but intelligence
has a diviner life, and is indestructible, turning either to good
or evil according to the direction given. Did you never observe 519
how the mind of a clever rogue peers out of his eyes, and the
more clearly he sees, the more evil he does ? Now if you take
such an one, and cut away from him those leaden weights of
pleasure and desire which bind his soul to earth, his intelligence
will be turned round, and he will behold the truth as clearly as
he now discerns his meaner ends. And have we not decided
that our rulers must neither be so uneducated as to have no fixed
rule of life, nor so over-educated as to be unwilling to leave
their paradise for the business of the world ? We must choose
out therefore the natures who are most likely to ascend to the
light and knowledge of the good ; but we must not allow them to
remain in the region of light ; they must be forced down again
among the captives in the den to partake of their labours and
honours. ' Will they not think this a hardship ? ' You should
remember that our purpose in framing the State was not that
our citizens should do what they like, but that they should serve
the State for the common good of all. May we not fairly say 520
to our philosopher, — Friend, we do you no wrong ; for in other

Analysis 520-523. ci

States philosophy grows wild, and a wild plant owes nothing Republic
to the gardener, but you have been trained by us to be the rulers VI1'

ANALYSIS.

and kings of our hive, and therefore we must insist on your
descending into the den. You must, each of you, take your turn,
and become able to use your eyes in the dark, and with a little
practice you will see far better than those who quarrel about
the shadows, whose knowledge is a dream only, whilst yours
is a waking reality. It may be that the saint or philosopher who
is best fitted, may also be the least inclined to rule, but necessity
is laid upon him, and he must no longer live in the heaven of
|2i ideas. And this will be the salvation of the State. For those who
rule must not be those who are desirous to rule ; and, if you can
oifer to our citizens a better life than that of rulers generally is,
there will be a chance that the rich, not only in this world's goods,
but in virtue and wisdom, may bear rule. And the only life
which is better than the life of political ambition is that of philo-
sophy, which is also the best preparation for the government
of a State.

Then now comes the question, — How shall we create our rulers ;
what way is there from darkness to light ? The change is effected
by philosophy ; it is not the turning over of an oyster-shell, but
the conversion of a soul from night to day, from becoming to
being. And what training will draw the soul upwards? Our
former education had two branches, gymnastic, which was
occupied with the body, and music, the sister art, which infused a

22 natural harmony into mind and literature ; but neither of these
sciences gave any promise of doing what we want. Nothing re-
mains to us but that universal or primary science of which all the
arts and sciences are partakers, I mean number or calculation.
* Very true.' Including the art of war ? * Yes, certainly.' Then
there is something ludicrous about Palamedes in the tragedy,
coming in and saying that he had invented number, and had
counted the ranks and set them in order. For if Agamemnon
could not count his feet (and without number how could he ?) he
must have been a pretty sort of general indeed. No man should
be a soldier who cannot count, and indeed he is hardly to be
called a man. But I am not speaking of these practical applica-*

23 tions of arithmetic, for number, in my view, is rather to be
regarded as a conductor to thought and being. I will explain

cii Analysis 525-526.

Republic what I mean by the last expression :— Things sensible are of two
ANALYSIS kinc^s 5 tne one class invite or stimulate the mind, while in the
other the mind acquiesces. Now the stimulating class are the
things which suggest contrast and relation. For example, suppose
that I hold up to the eyes three fingers — a fore finger, a middle
finger, a little finger — the sight equally recognizes all three
fingers, but without number cannot further distinguish them. Or
again, suppose two objects to be relatively great and small, these
ideas of greatness and smallness are supplied not by the sense,
but by the mind. And the perception of their contrast or relation 524
quickens and sets in motion the mind, which is puzzled by the
confused intimations of sense, and has recourse to number in order
to find out whether the things indicated are one or more than
one. Number replies that they are two and not one, and are to
be distinguished from one another. Again, the sight beholds
great and small, but only in a confused chaos, and not until they
are distinguished does the question arise of their respective
natures ; we are thus led on to the distinction between the visible
and intelligible. That was what I meant when I spoke of stimu-
lants to the intellect ; I was thinking of the contradictions which
arise in perception. The idea of unity, for example, like that of a
finger, does not arouse thought unless involving some conception
of plurality ; but when the one is also the opposite of one, the 525
contradiction gives rise to reflection ; an example of this is
afforded by any object of sight. All number has also an elevating
effect ; it raises the mind out of the foam and flux of generation to
the contemplation of being, having lesser military and retail uses
also. The retail use is not required by us ; but as our guardian is
to be a soldier as well as a philosopher, the military one may be
retained. And to our higher purpose no science can be better
adapted ; but it must be pursued in the spirit of a philosopher, not
of a shopkeeper. It is concerned, not with visible objects, but
with abstract truth ; for numbers are pure abstractions— the true
arithmetician indignantly denies that his unit is capable of division.
When you divide, he insists that you are only multiplying ; his 526
' one ' is not material or resolvable into fractions, but an unvarying
and absolute equality; and this proves the purely intellectual
character of his study. Note also the great power which arith-
metic has of sharpening the wits ; no other discipline is equally

Analysis 526—528. ciii

severe, or an equal test of general ability, or equally improving to Republic
a stupid person.

Let our second branch of education be geometry. * I can easily
see,' replied Glaucon, * that the skill of the general will be doubled
by his knowledge of geometry.' That is a small matter ; the use
of geometry, to which I refer, is the assistance given by it in the
contemplation of the idea of good, and the compelling the mind to
look at true being, and not at generation only. Yet the present
mode of pursuing these studies, as any one who is the least of a
mathematician is aware, is mean and ridiculous ; they are made to
look downwards to the arts, and not upwards to eternal existence.

527 The geometer is always talking of squaring, subtending, apposing,
as if he had in view action ; whereas knowledge is the real object
of the study. It should elevate the soul, and create the mind of
philosophy ; it should raise up what has fallen down, not to speak
of lesser uses in war and military tactics, and in the improvement
of the faculties.

Shall we propose, as a third branch of our education, astronomy ?
* Very good,' replied Glaucon ; ' the knowledge of the heavens is
necessary at once for husbandry, navigation, military tactics.' I
like your way of giving useful reasons for everything in order to
make friends of the world. And there is a difficulty in proving to
mankind that education is not only useful information but a
purification of the eye of the soul, which is better than the bodily

528 eye, for by this alone is truth seen. Now, will you appeal to man-
kind in general or to the philosopher ? or would you prefer to look
to yourself only? 'Every man is his own best friend.' Then
take a step backward, for we are out of order, and insert the third
dimension which is of solids, after the second which is of planes,
and then you may proceed to solids in motion. But solid geometry
is not popular and has not the patronage of the State, nor is the use
of it fully recognized ; the difficulty is great, and the votaries of the
study are conceited and impatient. Still the charm of the pursuit
wins upon men, and, if government would lend a little assistance,
there might be great progress made. ' Very true,' replied Glaucon ;
'but do I understand you now to begin with plane geometry,
and to place next geometry of solids, and thirdly, astronomy,
or the motion of solids?' Yes, I said; my hastiness has only
hindered us.

civ Analysis 528-531.

Republic ' Very good, and now let us proceed to astronomy, about which
ANALYSIS ^ am wiping to speak in your lofty strain. No one can fail to see 529
that the contemplation of the heavens draws the soul upwards.' I
am an exception, then ; astronomy as studied at present appears
to me to draw the soul not upwards, but downwards. Star-gazing
is just looking up at the ceiling — no better; a man may lie on
his back on land or on water — he may look up or look down, but
there is no science in that. The vision of knowledge of which
I speak is seen not with the eyes, but with the mind. All the
magnificence of the heavens is but the embroidery of a copy which
falls far short of the divine Original, and teaches nothing about the
absolute harmonies or motions of things. Their beauty is like the
beauty of figures drawn by the hand of Daedalus or any other
great artist, which may be used for illustration, but no mathemati- 530
cian would seek to obtain from them true conceptions of equality
or numerical relations. How ridiculous then to look for these in
the map of the heavens, in which the imperfection of matter comes
in everywhere as a disturbing element, marring the symmetry of
day and night, of months and years, of the sun and stars in their
courses. Only by problems can we place astronomy on a truly
scientific basis. Let the heavens alone, and exert the intellect.

Still, mathematics admit of other applications, as the Pytha-
goreans say, and we agree. There is a sister science of harmonical
motion, adapted to the ear as astronomy is to the eye, and there
may be other applications also. Let us inquire of the Pytha-
goreans about them, not forgetting that we have an aim higher
than theirs, which is the relation of these sciences to the idea
of good. The error which pervades astronomy also pervades
harmonics. The musicians put their ears in the place of their 531
minds. ' Yes,3 replied Glaucon, ' I like to see them laying their
ears alongside of their neighbours' faces — some saying, " That 's a
new note," others declaring that the two notes are the same.' Yes,
I said ; but you mean the empirics who are always twisting and
torturing the strings of the lyre, and quarrelling about the tempers
of the strings ; I am referring rather to the Pythagorean harmonists,
who are almost equally in error. For they investigate only the
numbers of the consonances which are heard, and ascend no
higher, — of the true numerical harmony which is unheard, and is
only to be found in problems, they have not even a conception.

Analysis 531-533- cv

'That last,' he said, 'must be a marvellous thing.' A thing, I RepiMic
replied, which is only useful if pursued with a view to the good. ANALYSIS

All these sciences are the prelude of the strain, and are profit-
able if they are regarded in their natural relations to one another.
' I dare say, Socrates,' said Glaucon ; ' but such a study will be an
endless business.' What study do you mean — of the prelude, or
what ? For all these things are only the prelude, and you surely
do not suppose that a mere mathematician is also a dialectician ?

532 ' Certainly not. I have hardly ever known a mathematician who
could reason.' And yet, Glaucon, is not true reasoning that hymn
of dialectic which is the music of the intellectual world, and which
was by us compared to the effort of sight, when from beholding
the shadows on the wall we arrived at last at the images which
gave the shadows ? Even so the dialectical faculty withdrawing
from sense arrives by the pure intellect at the contemplation of
the idea of good, and never rests but at the very end of the
intellectual world. And the royal road out of the cave into the
light, and the blinking of the eyes at the sun and turning to
contemplate the shadows of reality, not the shadows of an image
only — this progress and gradual acquisition of a new faculty of
sight by the help of the mathematical sciences, is the elevation of
the soul to the contemplation of the highest ideal of being.

' So far, I agree with you. But now, leaving the prelude, let us
proceed to the hymn. What, then, is the nature of dialectic, and

533 what are the paths which lead thither ? ' Dear Glaucon, you
cannot follow me here. There can be no revelation of the
absolute truth to one who has not been disciplined in the previous
sciences. But that there is a science of absolute truth, which
is attained in some way very different from those now practised,
I am confident. For all other arts or sciences are relative to
human needs and opinions ; and the mathematical sciences are
but a dream or hypothesis of true being, and never analyse their
own principles. Dialectic alone rises to the principle which is
above hypotheses, converting and gently leading the eye of the
soul out of the barbarous slough of ignorance into the light of the
upper world, with the help of the sciences which we have been
describing — sciences, as they are often termed, although they
require some other name, implying greater clearness than opinion
and less clearness than science, and this in our previous sketch

cvi Analysis 533-537.

Republic was understanding. And so we get four names — two for intellect,
and two for opinion, — reason or mind, understanding, faith, per-
ception of shadows — which make a proportion — being : becoming : : 534
intellect : opinion — and science : belief: : understanding : perception
of shadows. Dialectic may be further described as that science
which defines and explains the essence or being of each nature,
which distinguishes and abstracts the good, and is ready to do
battle against all opponents in the cause of good. To him who is
not a dialectician life is but a sleepy dream ; and many a man is in
his grave before he is well waked up. And would you have the
future rulers of your ideal State intelligent beings, or stupid as
posts ? ' Certainly not the latter.' Then you must train them in
dialectic, which will teach them to ask and answer questions, and
is the coping-stone of the sciences.

I dare say that you have not forgotten how our rulers were 535
chosen ; and the process of selection may be carried a step
further:— As before, they must be constant and valiant, good-
looking, and of noble manners, but now they must also have
natural ability which education will improve ; that is to say, they
must be quick at learning, capable of mental toil, retentive, solid,
diligent natures, who combine intellectual with moral virtues;
not lame and one-sided, diligent in bodily exercise and indolent in
mind, or conversely ; not a maimed soul, which hates falsehood
and yet unintentionally is always wallowing in the mire of 5 36
ignorance ; not a bastard or feeble person, but sound in wind and
limb, and in perfect condition for the great gymnastic trial of the
mind. Justice herself can find no fault with natures such as these ;
and they will be the saviours of our State ; disciples of another
sort would only make philosophy more ridiculous than she is at
present. Forgive my enthusiasm ; I am becoming excited ; but
when I see her trampled under foot, I am angry at the authors of
her disgrace. ' I did not notice that you were more excited than
you ought to have been.' But I felt that I was. Now do not let
us forget another point in the selection of our disciples— that they
must be young and not old. For Solon is mistaken in saying that
an old man can be always learning ; youth is the time of study,
and here we must remember that the mind is free and dainty, and,
unlike the body, must not be made to work against the grain.
Learning should be at first a sort of play, in which the natural bent 537

Analysis 537-539. cvii

is detected. As in training them for war, the young dogs should Republic
at first only taste blood ; but when the necessary gymnastics are ANALYS'IS
over which during two or three years divide life between sleep
and bodily exercise, then the education of the soul will become a
more serious matter. At twenty years of age, a selection must be
made of the more promising disciples, with whom a new epoch of
education will begin. The sciences which they have hitherto
learned in fragments will now be brought into relation with each
other and with true being; for the power of combining them is the
test of speculative and dialectical ability. And afterwards at
thirty a further selection shall be made of those who are able to
withdraw from the world of sense into the abstraction of ideas.
But at this point, judging from present experience, there is a
danger that dialectic may be the source of many evils. The
danger may be illustrated by a parallel case : — Imagine a person
who has been brought up in wealth and luxury amid a crowd of
flatterers, and who is suddenly informed that he is a supposititious

538 son. He has hitherto honoured his reputed parents and dis-
regarded the flatterers, and now he does the reverse. This is just
what happens with a man's principles. There are certain
doctrines which he learnt at home and which exercised a parental
authority over him. Presently he finds that imputations are cast
upon them ; a troublesome querist comes and asks, * What is the
just and good ? ' or proves that virtue is vice and vice virtue, and
his mind becomes unsettled, and he ceases to love, honour, and

539 obey them as he has hitherto done. He is seduced into the life of
pleasure, and becomes a lawless person and a rogue. The case of
such speculators is very pitiable, and, in order that our thirty
years' old pupils may not require this pity, let us take every
possible care that young persons do not study philosophy too
early. For a young man is a sort of puppy who only plays with
an argument ; and is reasoned into and out of his opinions every
day ; he soon begins to believe nothing, and brings himself and
philosophy into discredit. A man of thirty does not run on in this
way; he will argue and not merely contradict, and adds new
honour to philosophy by the sobriety of his conduct. What time
shall we allow for this second gymnastic training of the soul ? —
say, twice the time required for the gymnastics of the body ; six,
or perhaps five years, to commence at thirty, and then for fifteen

cviii The Divisions of Knowledge.

Republic years let the student go down into the den, and command armies,
ANALYSIS *^ gain exPerience of life. At fifty let him return to the end of 540
all things, and have his eyes uplifted to the idea of good, and order
his life after that pattern ; if necessary, taking his turn at the
helm of State, and training up others to be his successors. When
his time comes he shall depart in peace to the islands of the
blest. He shall be honoured with sacrifices, and receive such
worship as the Pythian oracle approves.

' You are a statuary, Socrates, and have made a perfect image
of our governors.' Yes, and of our governesses, for the women
will share in all things with the men. And you will admit that
our State is not a mere aspiration, but may really come into
being when there shall arise philosopher-kings, one or more,
who will despise earthly vanities, and will be the servants of
justice only. 'And how will they begin their work?' Their 541
first act will be to send away into the country all those who are
more than ten years of age, and to proceed with those who are
left. . . .

INTRODUC- At the commencement of the sixth book, Plato anticipated

TION.

his explanation of the relation of the philosopher to the world
in an allegory, in this, as in other passages, following the order
which he prescribes in education, and proceeding from the con-
crete to the abstract. At the commencement of Book VII, under
the figure of a cave having an opening towards a fire and a
way upwards to the true light, he returns to view the divisions
of knowledge, exhibiting familiarly, as in a picture, the result
which had been hardly won by a great effort of thought in the
previous discussion ; at the same time casting a glance onward
at the dialectical process, which is represented by the way leading
from darkness to light. The shadows, the images, the reflection
of the sun and stars in the water, the stars and sun themselves,
severally correspond, — the first, to the realm of fancy and poetry,
— the second, to the world of sense, — the third, to the abstractions
or universals of sense, of which the mathematical sciences furnish
the type, — the fourth and last to the same abstractions, when seen
in the unity of the idea, from which they derive a new meaning
and power. The true dialectical process begins with the con-
templation of the real stars, and not mere reflections of them,

The growth of Abstractions. cix

and ends with the recognition of the sun, or idea of good, as the Republic
parent not only of light but of warmth and growth. To the INTROD'UC.
divisions of knowledge the stages of education partly answer : — TION-
first, there is the early education of childhood and youth in the
fancies of the poets, and in the laws and customs of the State ;—
then there is the training of the body to be a warrior athlete,
and a good servant of the mind ; — and thirdly, after an interval
follows the education of later life, which begins with mathematics
and proceeds to philosophy in general.

There seem to be two great aims in the philosophy of Plato, —
first, to realize abstractions; secondly, to connect them. Ac-
cording to him, the true education is that which draws men from
becoming to being, and to a comprehensive survey of all being.
He desires to develop in the human mind the faculty of seeing
the universal in all things ; until at last the particulars of sense
drop away and the universal alone remains. He then seeks to
combine the universals which he has disengaged from sense, not
perceiving that the correlation of them has no other basis but
the common use of language. He never understands that ab-
stractions, as Hegel says, are ' mere abstractions ' — of use when
employed in the arrangement of facts, but adding nothing to the
sum of knowledge when pursued apart from them, or with
reference to an imaginary idea of good. Still the exercise of the
faculty of abstraction apart from facts has enlarged the mind,
and played a great part in the education of the human race. Plato
appreciated the value of this faculty, and saw that it might be
quickened by the study of number and relation. All things in
which there is opposition or proportion are suggestive of re-
flection. The mere impression of sense evokes no power of
thought or of mind, but when sensible objects ask to be compared
and distinguished, then philosophy begins. The science of arith-
metic first suggests such distinctions. There follow in order the
other sciences of plain and solid geometry, and of solids in
motion, one branch of which is astronomy or the harmony of
the spheres, — to this is appended the sister science of the har-
mony of sounds. Plato seems also to hint at the possibility of
other applications of arithmetical or mathematical proportions,
such as we employ in chemistry and natural philosophy, such
as the Pythagoreans and even Aristotle make use of in Ethics

ex A priori Astronomy.

Republic and Politics, e.g. his distinction between arithmetical and geo-
INTRODUC- metr^ca^ proportion in the Ethics (Book V), or between numerical
TION. ancj proportional equality in the Politics (iii. 8, iv. 12, &c.).

The modern mathematician will readily sympathise with Plato's
delight in the properties of pure mathematics. He will not be
disinclined to say with him :— Let alone the heavens, and study
the beauties of number and figure in themselves. He too will
be apt to depreciate their application to the arts. He will observe
that Plato has a conception of geometry, in which figures are to
be dispensed with ; thus in a distant and shadowy way seeming
to anticipate the possibility of working geometrical problems by
a more general mode of analysis. He will remark with interest
on the backward state of solid geometry, which, alas ! was not
encouraged by the aid of the State in the age of Plato ; and he
will recognize the grasp of Plato's mind in his ability to conceive
of one science of solids in motion including the earth as well
as the heavens, — not forgetting to notice the intimation to which
allusion has been already made, that besides astronomy and
harmonics the science of solids in motion may have other appli-
cations. Still more will he be struck with the comprehensiveness
of view which led Plato, at a time when these sciences hardly
existed, to say that they must be studied in relation to one
another, and to the idea of good, or common principle of truth
and being. But he will also see (and perhaps without surprise)
that in that stage of physical and mathematical knowledge, Plato
has fallen into the error of supposing that he can construct the
heavens a priori by mathematical problems, and determine the
principles of harmony irrespective of the adaptation of sounds to
the human ear. The illusion was a natural one in that age and
country. The simplicity and certainty of astronomy and har-
monics seemed to contrast with the variation and complexity
of the world of sense ; hence the circumstance that there was
some elementary basis of fact, some measurement of distance
or time or vibrations on which they must ultimately rest, was
overlooked by him. The modern predecessors of Newton fell
into errors equally great ; and Plato can hardly be said to have
.been very far wrong, or may even claim a sort of prophetic
insight into the subject, when we consider that the greater part
of astronomy at the present day consists of abstract dynamics,

Mystical applications of Mathematics. cxi

by the help of which most astronomical discoveries have been Republic
made. , "»•

INTHODUC-

The metaphysical philosopher from his point of view recognizes ™>N.
mathematics as an instrument of education, — which strengthens
the power of attention, developes the sense of order and the
faculty of construction, and enables the mind to grasp under
simple formulae the quantitative differences of physical phe-
nomena. But while acknowledging their value in education, he
sees also that they have no connexion with our higher moral
and intellectual ideas. In the attempt which Plato makes to
connect them, we easily trace the influences of ancient Pytha-
gorean notions. There is no reason to suppose that he is speak-
ing of the ideal numbers at p. 525 E ; but he is describing numbers
which are pure abstractions, to which he assigns a real and
separate existence, which, as ' the teachers of the art ' (meaning
probably the Pythagoreans) would have affirmed, repel all at-
tempts at subdivision, and in which unity and every other number
are conceived of as absolute. The truth and certainty of numbers,
when thus disengaged from phenomena, gave them a kind of
sacredness in the eyes of an ancient philosopher. Nor is it easy
to say how far ideas of order and fixedness may have had a moral
and elevating influence on the minds of men, * who,' in the words
of the Timaeus, 'might learn to regulate their erring lives ac-
cording to them' (47 C). It is worthy of remark that the old
Pythagorean ethical symbols still exist as figures of speech among
ourselves. And those who in modern times see the world per-
vaded by universal law, may also see an anticipation of this last
word of modern philosophy in the Platonic idea of good, which
is the source and measure of all things, and yet only an abstrac-
tion. (Cp. Philebus, sub fin.)

Two passages seem to require more particular explanations.
First, that which relates to the analysis of vision. The difficulty
in this passage may be explained, like many others, from dif-
ferences in the modes of conception prevailing among ancient
and modern thinkers. To us, the perceptions of sense are in-
separable from the act of the mind which accompanies them.
The consciousness of form, colour, distance, is indistinguishable
from the simple sensation, which is the medium of them.
Whereas to Plato sense is the Heraclitean flux of sense, not

cxii A priori Harmonics.

Republic the vision of objects in the order in which they actually present

INTRODUC- tnemselves to the experienced sight, but as they may be imagined

TION. fO appear confused and blurred to the half-awakened eye of the

infant. The first action of the mind is aroused by the attempt

to set in order this chaos, and the reason is required to frame

distinct conceptions under which the confused impressions of

sense may be arranged. Hence arises the question, * What is

great, what is small ?' and thus begins the distinction of the visible

and the intelligible.

The second difficulty relates to Plato's conception of harmonics.
Three classes of harmonists are distinguished by him : — first, the
Pythagoreans, whom he proposes to consult as in the previous
discussion on music he was to consult Damon — they are acknow-
ledged to be masters in the art, but are altogether deficient
in the knowledge of its higher import and relation to the good ;
secondly, the mere empirics, whom Glaucon appears to confuse
with them, and whom both he and Socrates .ludicrously describe
as experimenting by mere auscultation on the intervals of sounds.
Both of these fall short in different degrees of the Platonic idea
of harmony, which must be studied in a purely abstract way, first
by the method of problems, and secondly as a part of universal
knowledge in relation to the idea of good.

. The allegory has a political as well as a philosophical meaning.
The den or cave represents the narrow sphere of politics or law
(cp. the description of the philosopher and lawyer in the Theae-
tetus, 172-176), and the light of the eternal ideas is supposed to
exercise a disturbing influence on the minds of those who return
to this lower world. In other words, their principles are too
wide for practical application ; they are looking far away into
the past and future, when their business is with the present.
The ideal is not easily reduced to the conditions of actual life,
and may often be at variance with them. And at first, those
who return are unable to compete with the inhabitants of the
den in the measurement of the shadows, and are derided and
persecuted by them ; but after a while they see the things below
in far truer proportions than those who have never ascended
into the upper world. The difference between the politician
turned into a philosopher and the philosopher turned into a
politician, is symbolized by the two kinds of disordered eyesight,

T1ON.

The effects of Political Ideals. cxiii

the one which is experienced by the captive who is transferred Republic

from darkness to day, the other, of the heavenly messenger who INTROD^.C.

voluntarily for the good of his fellow-men descends into the den.

In what way the brighter light is to dawn on the inhabitants

of the lower world, or how the idea of good is to become

the guiding principle of politics, is left unexplained by Plato.

Like the nature and divisions of dialectic, of which Glaucon

impatiently demands to be informed, perhaps he would have

said that the explanation could not be given except to a disciple ^

of the previous sciences. (Compare Symposium 210 A.)

Many illustrations of this part of the Republic may be found in
modern Politics and in daily life. For among ourselves, too,
there have been two sorts of Politicians or Statesmen, whose
eyesight has become disordered in two different ways. First,
there have been great men who, in the language of Burke, * have
been too much given to general maxims,' who, like J. S. Mill
or Burke himself, have been theorists or philosophers before they
were politicians, or who, having been students of history, have
allowed some great historical parallel, such as the English Revo-
lution of 1688, or possibly Athenian democracy or Roman
Imperialism, to be the medium through which they viewed
contemporary events. Or perhaps the long projecting shadow
of some existing institution may have darkened their vision. The
Church of the future, the Commonwealth of the future, the Society
of the future, have so absorbed their minds, that they are unable
to see in their true proportions the Politics of to-day. They
have been intoxicated with great ideas, such as liberty, or
equality, or the greatest happiness of the greatest number, or
the brotherhood of humanity, and they no longer care to consider
how these ideas must be limited in practice or harmonized with
the conditions of human life. They are full of light, but the light
to them has become only a sort of luminous mist or blindness.
Almost every one has known some enthusiastic half-educated
person, who sees everything at false distances, and in erroneous
proportions.

With this disorder of eyesight may be contrasted another—
of those who see not far into the distance, but what is near only ;
who have been engaged all their lives in a trade or a profession ;
who are limited to a set or sect of their own. Men of this kind

cxiv The dangers which beset youth

Republic have no universal except their own interests or the interests

of their class, no principle but the opinion of persons like them-

selves, no knowledge of affairs beyond what they pick up in
the streets or at their club. Suppose them to be sent into a
larger world, to undertake some higher calling, from being
tradesmen to turn generals or politicians, from being school-
masters to become philosophers : — or imagine them on a sudden
to receive an inward light which reveals to them for the first
time in their lives a higher idea of God and the existence of a
spiritual world, by this sudden conversion or change is not their
daily life likely to be upset ; and on the other hand will not many
of their old prejudices and narrownesses still adhere to them
long after they have begun to take a more comprehensive view
of human things? From familiar examples like these we may
learn what Plato meant by the eyesight which is liable to two
kinds of disorders.

Nor have we any difficulty in drawing a parallel between the
young Athenian in the fifth century before Christ who became
unsettled by new ideas, and the student of a modern University
who has been the subject of a similar ' aufklarung.' We too
observe that when young men begin to criticise customary beliefs,
or to analyse the constitution of human nature, they are apt to
lose hold of solid principle (dnav TO fifftaiov avrav e'£ot'xcrat). They
are like trees which have been frequently transplanted. The
earth about them is loose, and they have no roots reaching far
into the soil. They Might upon every flower,' following their
own wayward wills, or because the wind blows them. They
catch opinions, as diseases are caught— when they are in the
air. Borne hither and thither, 'they speedily fall into beliefs'
the opposite of those in which they were brought up. They
hardly retain the distinction of right and wrong ; they seem to think
one thing as good as another. They suppose themselves to be
searching after truth when they are playing the game of ' follow my
leader.* They fall in love ' at first sight ' with paradoxes respecting
morality, some fancy about art, some novelty or eccentricity in
religion, and like lovers they are so absorbed for a time in their
new notion that they can think of nothing else. The resolution of
some philosophical or theological question seems to them more
interesting and important than any substantial knowledge of

in times of transition. cxv

literature or science or even than a good life. Like the youth Republic
in the Philebus, they are ready to discourse to any one about a INTROD"UC.
new philosophy. They are generally the disciples of some TION>
eminent professor or sophist, whom they rather imitate than
understand. They may be counted happy if in later years they
retain some of the simple truths which they acquired in early
education, and which they may, perhaps, find to be worth all
the rest. Such is the picture which Plato draws and which we
only reproduce, partly in his own words, of the dangers which
beset youth in times of transition, when old opinions are fading
away and the new are not yet firmly established. Their condition
is ingeniously compared by him to that of a supposititious son,
who has made the discovery that his reputed parents are not
his real ones, and, in consequence, they have lost their authority
over him.

The distinction between the mathematician and the dialectician
is also noticeable. Plato is very well aware that the faculty of
the mathematician is quite distinct from the higher philosophical
sense which recognizes and combines first principles (531 E).
The contempt which he expresses at p. 533 for distinctions of
words, the danger of involuntary falsehood, the apology which
Socrates makes for his earnestness of speech, are highly charac-
teristic of the Platonic style and mode of thought. The quaint
notion that if Palamedes was the inventor of number Agamemnon
could not have counted his feet ; the art by which we are made to
believe that this State of ours is not a dream only ; the gravity
with which the first step is taken in the actual creation of the
State, namely, the sending out of the city all who had arrived
at ten years of age, in order to expedite the business of education
by a generation, are also truly Platonic. (For the last, compare
the passage at the end of the third book (415 D), in which he
expects the lie about the earthborn men to be believed in the
second generation.)

eph. BOOK VTII. And so we have arrived at the conclusion, that ANALYSIS.

* in the perfect State wives and children are to be in common ; and

the education and pursuits of men and women, both in war and

peace, are to be common, and kings are to be philosophers an<J

warriors, and the soldiers of the State are to live together,

i 2

cxvi Analysis 543-546.

Republic having all things in common ; and they are to be warrior athletes,
AN ' receiving no pay but only their food, from the other citizens.
Now let us return to the point at which we digressed. ' That is
easily done,' he replied : ' You were speaking of the State which
you had constructed, and of the individual who answered to this,
both of whom you affirmed to be good ; and you said that of 544
inferior States there were four forms and four individuals cor-
responding to them, which although deficient in various degrees,
were all of them worth inspecting with a view to determining
the relative happiness or misery of the best or worst man. Then
Polemarchus and Adeimantus interrupted you, and this led to
another argument, — and so here we are.' Suppose that we put
ourselves again in the same position, and do you repeat your
question. * I should like to know of what constitutions you were
speaking?' Besides the perfect State there are only four of
any note in Hellas :— first, the famous Lacedaemonian or Cretan
commonwealth ; secondly, oligarchy, a State full of evils ; thirdly,
democracy, which follows next in order ; fourthly, tyranny, which
is the disease or death of all government. Now, States are not
made of ' oak and rock,' but of flesh and blood ; and therefore as
there are five States there must be five human natures in in-
dividuals, which correspond to them. And first, there is the
ambitious nature, which answers to the Lacedaemonian State; 545
secondly, the oligarchical nature ; thirdly, the democratical ; and
fourthly, the tyrannical. This last will have to be compared with
the perfectly just, which is the fifth, that we may know which is
the happier, and then we shall be able to determine whether
the argument of Thrasymachus or our own is the more convincing.
And as before we began with the State and went on to the
individual, so now, beginning with timocracy, let us go on to
the timocratical man, and then proceed to the other forms of
government, and the individuals who answer to them.

But how did timocracy arise out of the perfect State ? Plainly,
like all changes of government, from division in the rulers. But
whence came division ? * Sing, heavenly Muses,' as Homer says ;
—let them condescend to answer us, as if we were children, to
whom they put on a solemn face in jest. * And what will they
say ? ' They will say that human things are fated to decay, and 546
even the perfect State will not escape from this law of destiny,

Analysis 546-548. cxvii

when ' the wheel comes full circle ' in a period short or long. Plants Republic
or animals have times of fertility and sterility, which the intel- ANALVSJS
ligence of rulers because alloyed by sense will not enable them to
ascertain, and children will be born out of season. For whereas
divine creations are in a perfect cycle or number, the human
creation is in a number which declines from perfection, and has
four terms' and three intervals of numbers, increasing, waning,
assimilating, dissimilating, and yet perfectly commensurate with
each other. - The base of the number with a fourth added (or
which is 3 : 4), multiplied by five and cubed, gives two har-
monies : — The first a square number, which is a hundred times
the base (or a hundred times a hundred) ; the second, an oblong,
being a hundred squares of the rational diameter of a figure the
side of which is five, subtracting one from each square or two .
perfect squares from all, and adding a hundred cubes of three.
This entire number is geometrical and contains the rule or law of
generation. When this law is neglected marriages will be un-
propitious ; the inferior offspring who are then born will in time
become the rulers ; the State will decline, and education fall into
decay ; gymnastic will be preferred to music, and the gold and

547 silver and brass and iron will form a chaotic mass — thus division
will arise. Such is the Muses' answer to our question. 'And
a true answer, of course : — but what more have they to say ? '
They say that the two races, the iron and brass, and the silver and
gold, will draw the State different ways; — the one will take to
trade and moneymaking, and the others, having the true riches
and not caring for money, will resist them : the contest will end
in a compromise ; they will agree to have private property, and
will enslave their fellow-citizens who were once their friends
and nurturers. But they will retain their warlike character, and
will be chiefly occupied in fighting and exercising rule. Thus
arises timocracy, which is intermediate between aristocracy and
oligarchy.

The new form of government resembles the ideal in obedience
to rulers and contempt for trade, in having common meals, and in
devotion to warlike and gymnastic exercises. But corruption has
crept into philosophy, and simplicity of character, which was once

548 her note, is now looked for only in the military class. Arts of war
begin to prevail over arts of peace; the ruler is no longer a

cxviii Analysis 548-551.

Republic philosopher; as in oligarchies, there springs up among them
an extravaSant l°ve °f gain— get another man's and save your
own, is their principle ; and they have dark places in which they
hoard their gold and silver, for the use of their women and others ;
they take their pleasures by stealth^ like boys who are running
away from their father— the law; and their education is not
inspired by the Muse, but imposed by the strong arm of power.
The leading characteristic of this State is party spirit and
ambition.

And what manner of man answers to such a State ? * In love
of contention,' replied Adeimantus, 'he will be like our friend
Glaucon.' In that respect, perhaps, but not in others. He
is self- asserting and ill-educated, yet fond of literature, al- 549
though not himself a speaker, — fierce with slaves, but obedient
to rulers, a lover of power and honour, which he hopes to
gain by deeds of arms, — fond, too, of gymnastics and of hunting.
As he advances in years he grows avaricious, for he has lost
philosophy, which is the only saviour and guardian of men. His
origin is as follows: — His father is a good man dwelling in an
ill-ordered State, who has retired from politics in order that he
may lead a quiet life. His mother is angry at her loss of prece-
dence among other women ; she is disgusted at her husband's
selfishness, and she expatiates to her son on the unmanliness
and indolence of his father. The old family servant takes up
the tale, and says to the youth : — ' When you grow up you must be
more of a man than your father.' All the world are agreed that 550
he who minds his own business is an idiot, while a busybody is
highly honoured and esteemed. The young man compares this
spirit with his father's words and ways, and as he is naturally
well disposed, although he has suffered from evil influences, he
rests at a middle point and becomes ambitious and a lover of
honour.

And now let us set another city over against another man.
The next form of government is oligarchy, in which the rule
is of the rich only ; nor is it difficult to see how such a State
arises. The decline begins with the possession of gold and silver ;
illegal modes of expenditure are invented ; one draws another
on, and the multitude are infected; riches outweigh virtue;
lovers of money take the place of lovers of honour; misers of 551

Analysis 551-553. cxix

politicians ; and, in time, political privileges are confined by law Republic
to the rich, who do not shrink from violence in order to effect

ANALYSIS.

their purposes.

Thus much of the origin,— let us next consider the evils of
oligarchy. Would a man who wanted to be safe on a voyage take
a bad pilot because he was rich, or refuse a good one because
he was poor? And does not the analogy apply still more to
the State ? And there are yet greater evils : two nations are
struggling together in one— the rich and the poor ; and the rich
- dare not put arms into the hands of the poor, and are unwilling to
pay for defenders out of their own money. And have we not

552 already condemned that State in which the same persons are
warriors as well as shopkeepers ? The greatest evil of all is that
a man may sell his property and have no place in the State ;
while there is one class which has enormous wealth, the other
is entirely destitute. But observe that these destitutes had not
really any more of the governing nature in them when they were
rich than now that they are poor; they were miserable spend-
thrifts always. They are the drones of the hive; only whereas
the actual drone is unprovided by nature with a sting, the two-
legged things whom we call drones are some of them without stings
and some of them have dreadful stings ; in other words, there
are paupers and there are rogues. These are never far apart ;
and in oligarchical cities, where nearly everybody is a pauper
who is not a ruler, you will find abundance of both. And
this evil state of society originates in bad education and bad
government.

553 Like State, like man,— the change in the latter begins with the
representative of timocracy ; he walks at first in the ways of his
father, who may have been a statesman, or general, perhaps;
and presently he sees him ' fallen from his high estate,' the victim
of informers, dying in prison or exile, or by the hand of the
executioner. The lesson which he thus receives, makes him
cautious ; he leaves politics, represses his pride, and saves pence.
Avarice is enthroned as his bosom's lord, and assumes the style
of the Great King ; the rational and spirited elements sit humbly
on the ground at either side, the one immersed in calculation, the
other absorbed in the admiration of wealth. The love of honour
turns to love of money; the conversion is instantaneous. The

cxx Analysis 554-557.

Republic man is mean, saving, toiling, the slave of one passion which is 554

ANALYSIS.

VIH- the master of the rest : Is he not the very image of the State ?

He has had no education, or he would never have allowed the
blind god of riches to lead the dance within him. And being
uneducated he will have many slavish desires, some beggarly,
some knavish, breeding in his soul. If he is the trustee of an
orphan, and has the power to defraud, he will soon prove that he
is not without the will, and that his passions are only restrained
by fear and not by reason. Hence he leads a divided existence ;
in which the better desires mostly prevail. But when he is con- 555
tending for prizes and other distinctions, he is afraid to incur a loss
which is to be repaid only by barren honour ; in time of war he
fights with a small part of his resources, and usually keeps his
money and loses the victory.

Next comes democracy and the democratic man, out of oli-
garchy and the oligarchical man. Insatiable avarice is the ruling
passion of an oligarchy ; and they encourage expensive habits in
order that they may gain by the ruin of extravagant youth. Thus
men of family often lose their property or rights of citizenship ;
but they remain in the city, full of hatred against the new owners
of their estates and ripe for revolution. The usurer with stooping
walk pretends not to see them ; he passes by, and leaves his
sting — that is, his money — in some other victim ; and many a
man has to pay the parent or principal sum multiplied into a
family of children, and is reduced into a state of dronage by him. 556
The only way of diminishing the evil is either to limit a man in
his use of his property, or to insist that he shall lend at his own
risk. But the ruling class do not want remedies ; they care
only for money, and are as careless of virtue as the poorest of the
citizens. Now there are occasions on which the governors and
the governed meet together, — at festivals, on a journey, voyaging
or fighting. The sturdy pauper finds that in the hour of danger
he is not despised ; he sees the rich man puffing and panting,
and draws tlie conclusion which he privately imparts to his com-
panions,— ' that our people are not good for much ; ' and as a
sickly frame is made ill by a mere touch from without, or some-
times without external impulse is ready to fall to pieces of itself,
so from the least cause, or with none at all, the city falls ill and
fights a battle for life or death. And democracy comes into 557

Analysis 557-559-

CXXl

power when the poor are the victors, killing some and exiling
some, and giving equal shares in the government to all the rest.

The manner of life in such a State is that of democrats ; there
is freedom and plainness of speech, and every man does what
is right in his own eyes,* and has his own way of life. Hence
arise the most various developments of character ; the State is
like a piece of embroidery of which the colours and figures are
the manners of men, and there are many who, like women and
children, prefer this variety to real beauty and excellence. The
State is not one but many, like a bazaar at which you can buy
anything. The great charm is, that you may do as you like ;
you may govern if you like, let it alone if you like ; go to war

558 and make peace if you feel disposed, and all quite irrespective
of anybody else. When you condemn men to death they remain
alive all the same ; a gentleman is desired to go into exile,
and he stalks about the streets like a hero; and nobody sees
him or cares for him. Observe, too, how grandly Democracy
sets her foot upon all our fine theories of education, — how little
she cares for the training of her statesmen ! The only quali-
fication which she demands is the profession of patriotism. Such
is democracy ;— a pleasing, lawless, various sort of government,
distributing equality to equals and unequals alike. ,

Let us now inspect the individual democrat ; and first, as in
the case of the State, we will trace his antecedents. He is the
son of a miserly oligarch, and has been taught by him to restrain
the love of unnecessary pleasures. Perhaps I ought to explain

559 this latter term : — Necessary pleasures are those which are
good, and which we cannot do without; unnecessary pleasures
are those which do no good, and of which the desire might
be eradicated by early training. For example, the pleasures
of eating and drinking are necessary and healthy, up to a certain
point ; beyond that point they are alike hurtful to body and
mind, and the excess may be avoided. When in excess, they
may be rightly called expensive pleasures, in opposition to the
useful ones. And the drone, as we called him, is the slave of
these unnecessary pleasures and desires, whereas the miserly
oligarch is subject only to the necessary.

The oligarch changes into the democrat in the following
manner: — The youth who has had a miserly bringing up, gets

Rfptiblic

VIII.
ANALYSIS.

cxxii Analysis 559-562.

Republic a taste of the drone's honey; he meets with wild companions,
ANALYSIS w^° mtro(^uce mm to every new pleasure. As in the State, so
in the individual, there are allies on both sides, temptations from
without and passions from within ; there is reason also and
external influences of parents and friends in alliance with the
oligarchical principle ; and the two factions are in violent conflict 560
with one another. Sometimes the party of order prevails, but
then again new desires and new disorders arise, and the whole
mob of passions gets possession of the Acropolis, that is to say,
the soul, which they find void and unguarded by true words
and works. Falsehoods and illusions ascend to take their place ;
the prodigal goes back into the country of the Lotophagi or
drones, and openly dwells there. And if any offer of alliance
or parley of individual elders comes from home, the false spirits
shut the gates of the castle and permit no one to enter, — there
is a battle, and they gain the victory ; and straightway making
alliance with the desires, they banish modesty, which they call
folly, and send temperance over the border. When the house
has been swept and garnished, they dress up the exiled vices, and,
crowning them with garlands, bring them back under new names.
Insolence they call good breeding, anarchy freedom, waste mag-
nificence, impudence courage. Such is the process by which the 561
youth passes from the necessary pleasures to the unnecessary.
After a while he divides his time impartially between them ; and
perhaps, when he gets older and the violence of passion has
abated, he restores some of the exiles and lives in a sort of equi-
librium, indulging first one pleasure and then another; and if
reason comes and tells him that some pleasures are good and
honourable, and others bad and vile, he shakes his head and says
that he can make no distinction between them. Thus he lives
in the fancy of the hour ; sometimes he takes to drink, and then
he turns abstainer ; he practises in the gymnasium or he does
nothing at all; then again he would be a philosopher or a
politician ; or again, he would be a warrior or a man of business ;

he is

'Every thing by starts and nothing long.'

There remains still the finest and fairest of all men and all 562
States— tyranny and the tyrant. Tyranny springs from de-
mocracy much as democracy springs from oligarchy. Both arise

Analysis 562-564. cxxiii

from excess; the one from excess of wealth, the other from Republic
excess of freedom. 'The great natural good of life,' says the
democrat, ' is freedom.' And this exclusive love of freedom and
regardlessness of everything else, is the cause of the change
from democracy to tyranny. The State demands the strong
wine of freedom, and unless her rulers give her a plentiful
draught, punishes and insults them ; equality and fraternity of
governors and governed is the approved principle. Anarchy is
the law, not of the State only, but of private houses, and extends

563 even to the animals. Father and son, citizen and foreigner, teacher
and pupil, old and young, are all on a level ; fathers and teachers
fear their sons and pupils, and the wisdom of the young man
is a match for the elder, and the old imitate the jaunty manners
of the young because they are afraid of being thought morose.
Slaves are on a level with their masters and mistresses, and
there is no difference between men and women. Nay, the very
animals in a democratic State have a freedom which is unknown
in other places. The she-dogs are as good as their she-mistresses,
and horses and asses march along with dignity and run their
noses against anybody who comes in their way. ' That has often
been my experience.' At last the citizens become so sensitive
that they cannot endure the yoke of laws, written or unwritten ;
they would have no man call himself their master. Such is
the glorious beginning of things out of which tyranny springs.
* Glorious, indeed ; but what is to follow ? ' The ruin of oligarchy

564 is the ruin of democracy ; for there is a law of contraries ; the
excess of freedom passes into the excess of slavery, and the
greater the freedom the greater the slavery. You will remember
that in the oligarchy were found two classes— rogues and paupers,
whom we compared to drones with and without stings. These
two classes are to the State what phlegm and bile are to the
human body; and the State-physician, or legislator, must get
rid of them, just as the bee-master keeps the drones out of the
hive. Now in a democracy, too, there are drones, but they are
more numerous and more dangerous than in the oligarchy;
there they are inert and unpractised, here they are full of life
and animation ; and the keener sort speak and act, while the
others buzz about the bema and prevent their opponents from
being heard. And there is another class in democratic States,

cxxiv Analysis 564-567.

Republic of respectable, thriving individuals, who can be squeezed when
. ' the drones have need of their possessions ; there is more- 565

ANALYSIS.

over a third class, who are the labourers and the artisans, and
they make up the mass of the people. When the people meet,
they are omnipotent, but they cannot be brought together un-
less they are attracted by a little honey ; and the rich are
made to supply the honey, of which the demagogues keep the
greater part themselves, giving a taste only to the mob. Their
victims attempt to resist; they are driven mad by the stings
of the drones, and so become downright oligarchs in self-defence.
Then follow informations and convictions for treason. The
people have some protector whom they nurse into greatness,
and from this root the tree of tyranny springs. The nature of
the change is indicated in the old fable of the temple of Zeus
Lycaeus, which tells how he who tastes human flesh mixed up
with the flesh of other victims will turn into a wolf. Even so
the protector, who tastes human blood, and. slays some and
exiles others with or without law, who hints at abolition of
debts and division of lands, must either perish or become a 566
wolf— that is, a tyrant. Perhaps he is driven out, but he soon
comes back from exile ; and then if his enemies cannot get rid
of him by lawful means, they plot his assassination. Thereupon
the friend of the people makes his well-known request to them
for a body-guard, which they readily grant, thinking only of his
danger and not of their own. Now let the rich man make to
himself wings, for he will never run away again if he does not
do so then. And the Great Protector, having crushed all his
rivals, stands proudly erect in the chariot of State, a full-blown
tyrant : Let us enquire into the nature of his happiness.

In the early days of his tyranny he smiles and beams upon
everybody ; he is not a ' dominus,' no, not he : he has only come
to put an end to debt and the monopoly of land. Having got rid
of foreign enemies, he makes himself necessary to the State by 567
always going to war. He is thus enabled to depress the poor
by heavy taxes, and so keep them at work ; and he can get rid
of bolder spirits by handing them over to the enemy. Then
comes unpopularity ; some of his old associates have the courage
to oppose him. The consequence is, that he has to make a
purgation of the State; but, unlike the physician who purges

Analysis 567-569. cxxv

away the bad, he must get rid of the high-spirited, the wise and Republic
the wealthy; for he has no choice between death and a life of '

ANALYSIS.

shame and dishonour. And the more hated he is, the more he
will require trusty guards ; but how will he obtain them ? * They
will come flocking like birds — for pay.' Will he not rather obtain
them on the spot? He will take the slaves from their owners

568 and make them his body-guard ; these are his trusted friends,
who admire and look up to him. Are not the tragic poets wise
who magnify and exalt the tyrant, and say that he is wise by
association with the wise ? And are not their praises of tyranny
alone a sufficient reason why we should exclude them from our
State ? They may go to other cities, and gather the mob about
them with fine words, and change commonwealths into tyrannies
and democracies, receiving honours and rewards for their
services ; but the higher they and their friends ascend constitution
hill, the more their honour will fail and become 'too asthmatic
to mount.' To return to the tyrant — How will he support that
rare army of his ? First, by robbing the temples of their treasures,
which will enable him to lighten the taxes; then he will take
all his father's property, and spend it on his companions, male
or female. Now his father is the demus, and if the demus gets

569 angry, and says that a great hulking son ought not to be a burden
on his parents, and bids him and his riotous crew begone, then
will the parent know what a monster he has been nurturing,
and that the son whom he would fain expel is too strong for
him. 'You do not mean to say that he will beat his father?'
Yes, he will, after having taken away his arms. 'Then he is
a parricide and a cruel, unnatural son.' And the people have
jumped from the fear of slavery into slavery, out of the smoke
into the fire. Thus liberty, when out of all order and reason,
passes into the worst form of servitude. . . .

In the previous books Plato has described the ideal State ; now INTRODUC-
he returns to the perverted or declining forms, on which he
had lightly touched at the end of Book iv. These he describes in
a succession of parallels between the individuals and the States,
tracing the origin of either in the State or individual which has
preceded them. He begins by asking the point at which he
digressed; and is thus led shortly to recapitulate the substance

cxxvi The order of decline in States

Republic of the three former books, which also contain a parallel of the
VIIL philosopher and the State.

INTRODUC- < k

•HON. Of the first decline he gives no intelligible account ; he would

not have liked to admit the most probable causes of the fall of his
ideal State, which to us would appear to be the impracticability of
communism or the natural antagonism of the ruling and subject
classes. He throws a veil of mystery over the origin of the
decline, which he attributes to ignorance of the law of population.
Of this law the famous geometrical figure or number is the
expression. Like the ancients in general, he had no idea of the
gradual perfectibility of man or of the education of the human
race. His ideal was not to be attained in the course of ages,
but was to spring in full armour from the head of the legislator.
When good laws had been given, he thought only of the manner
in which they were likely to be corrupted, or of how they might
be filled up in detail or restored in accordance with their original
spirit. He appears not to have reflected upon the full meaning of
his own words, ' In the brief space of human life, nothing great
can be accomplished ' (x. 608 B) ; or again, as he afterwards says
in the Laws (iii. 676), * Infinite time is the maker of cities.' The
order of constitutions which is adopted by him represents an
order of thought rather than a succession of time, and may be
considered as the first attempt to frame a philosophy of history.

The first of these declining States is timocracy, or the govern-
ment of soldiers and lovers of honour, which answers to the
Spartan State ; this is a government of force, in which education
is not inspired by the Muses, but imposed by the law, and in
which all the finer elements of organization have disappeared.
The philosopher himself has lost the love of truth, and the soldier,
who is of a simpler and honester nature, rules in his stead. The
individual who answers to timocracy has some noticeable qualities.
He is described as ill educated, but, like the Spartan, a lover of
literature ; and although he is a harsh master to his servants he
has no natural superiority over them. His character is based
upon a reaction against the circumstances of his father, who in
a troubled city has retired from politics; and his mother, who
is dissatisfied at her own position, is always urging him towards
the life of political ambition. Such a character may have had
this origin, and indeed Livy attributes the Licinian laws to a •

not historical but imaginary. cxxvii

feminine jealousy of a similar kind (vii. 34). But there is obviously Republic
no connection between the manner in which the timocratic State T

INTRODUC-

springs out of the ideal, and the mere accident by which the TION.
timocratic man is the son of a retired statesman.

The two next stages in the decline of constitutions have even
less historical foundation. For there is no trace in Greek history
of a polity like the Spartan or Cretan passing into an oligarchy of
wealth, or of the oligarchy of wealth passing into a democracy.
The order of history appears to be different ; first, in the Homeric
times there is the royal or patriarchal form of government, which
a century or two later was succeeded by an oligarchy of birth
rather than of wealth, and in which wealth was only the accident
of the hereditary possession of land and power. Sometimes this
oligarchical government gave way to a government based upon a
qualification of property, which, according to Aristotle's mode of
using words, would have been called a timocracy ; and this in
some cities, as at Athens, became the conducting medium to
democracy. But such was not the necessary order of succession
in States ; nor, indeed, can any order be discerned in the endless
fluctuation of Greek history (like the tides in the Euripus), except,
perhaps, in the almost uniform tendency from monarchy to
aristocracy in the earliest times. At first sight there appears to
be a similar inversion in the last step of the Platonic succession ;
for tyranny, instead of being the natural end of democracy, in
early Greek history appears rather as a stage leading to de-
mocracy; the reign of Peisistratus and his sons is an episode
which comes between the legislation of Solon and the constitution
of Cleisthenes ; and some secret cause common to them all seems
to have led the greater part of Hellas at her first appearance in
the dawn of history, e.g. Athens, Argos, Corinth, Sicyon, and
nearly every State with the exception of Sparta, through a similar
stage of tyranny which ended either in oligarchy or democracy.
But then we must remember that Plato is describing rather the
contemporary governments of the Sicilian States, which alternated
between democracy and tyranny, than the ancient history of
Athens or Corinth.

The portrait of the tyrant himself is just such as the later Greek
delighted to draw of Phalaris and Dionysius, in which, as in the
lives of mediaeval saints or mythic heroes, the conduct and actions

cxxviii The exaggeration of Tyranny and Democracy.

Republic of one were attributed to another in order to fill up the outline.
VIII. There was no enormity which the Greek was not ready to believe

INTRODUC-
TION, of them ; the tyrant was the negation of government and law ; his

assassination was glorious; there was no crime, however un-
natural, which might not with probability be attributed to him.
In this, Plato was only following the common thought of his
countrymen, which he embellished and exaggerated with all
the power of his genius. There is no need to suppose that he
drew from life ; or that his knowledge of tyrants is derived from a
personal acquaintance with Dionysius. The manner in which
he speaks of them would rather tend to render doubtful his ever
having ' consorted ' with them, or entertained the schemes, which
are attributed to him in the Epistles, of regenerating Sicily by
their help.

Plato in a hyperbolical and serio-comic vein exaggerates the
follies of democracy which he also sees reflected in social life.
To him democracy is a state of individualism or dissolution ;
in which every one is doing what is right in his own eyes. Of
a people animated by a common spirit of liberty, rising as one
man to repel the Persian host, which is the leading idea of
democracy in Herodotus and Thucydides, he never seems to
think. But il he is not a believer in liberty, still less is he a lover
of tyranny. His deeper and more serious condemnation is re-
served for the tyrant, who is the ideal of wickedness and also
of weakness, and who in his utter helplessness and suspiciousness
is leading an almost impossible existence, without that remnant of
good which, in Plato's opinion, was required to give power to
evil (Book i. p. 352). This ideal of wickedness living in helpless
misery, is the reverse of that other portrait of perfect injustice
ruling in happiness and splendour, which first of all Thrasy-
machus, and afterwards the sons of Ariston had drawn, and
is also the reverse of the king whose rule of life is the good of
his subjects.

Each of these governments and individuals has a corresponding
ethical gradation : the ideal State is under the rule of reason, not
extinguishing but harmonizing the passions, and training them
in virtue ; in the timocracy and the timocratic man the constitu-
tion, whether of the State or of the individual, is based, first, upon
courage, and secondly, upon the love of honour ; this latter virtue,

Free use of metaphor in Plato. cxxix

which is hardly to be esteemed a virtue, has superseded all the Republic
rest. In the second stage of decline the virtues have altogether INTROD '
disappeared, and the love of gain has succeeded to them ; in the TION-
third stage, or democracy, the various passions are allowed to
have free play, and the virtues and vices are impartially culti-
vated. But this freedom, which leads to many curious extrava-
gances of character, is in reality only a state of weakness and
dissipation. At last, one monster passion takes possession of the
whole nature of man — this is tyranny. In all of them excess —
the excess first of wealth and then of freedom, is the element of
decay.

The eighth book of the Republic abounds in pictures of life and
fanciful allusions ; the use of metaphorical language is carried to a
greater extent than anywhere else in Plato. We may remark,
(i), the description of the two nations in one, which become more
and more divided in the Greek Republics, as in feudal times, and
perhaps also in our own ; (2), the notion of democracy expressed
in a sort of Pythagorean formula as equality among unequals ;
(3), the free and easy ways of men and animals, which are charac-
teristic of liberty, as foreign mercenaries and universal mistrust
are of the tyrant ; (4), the proposal that mere debts should not be
recoverable by law is a speculation which has often been enter-
tained by reformers of the law in modern times, and is in harmony
with the tendencies of modern legislation. Debt and land were
the two great difficulties of the ancient lawgiver : in modern times
we may be said to have almost, if not quite, solved the first of these
difficulties, but hardly the second.

Still more remarkable are the corresponding portraits of in-
dividuals : there is the family picture of the father and mother
and the old servant of the timocratical man, and the out-
ward respectability and inherent meanness of the oligarchical ;
the uncontrolled licence and freedom of the democrat, in which
the young Alcibiades seems to be depicted, doing right or wrong
as he pleases, and who at last, like the prodigal, goes into a far
country (note here the play of language by which the democratic
man is himself represented under the image of a State having
a citadel and receiving embassies) ; and there is the wild-beast
nature, which breaks loose in his successor. The hit about the
tyrant being a parricide ; the representation of the tyrant's life as

k

cxxx The Number of the State.

Republic an obscene dream ; the rhetorical surprise of a more miserable
VIII. than the most miserable of men in Book ix ; the hint to the poets

INTRODUC- \

TION. that if they are the friends of tyrants there is no place for them in
a constitutional State, and that they are too clever not to see the
propriety of their own expulsion ; the continuous image of the
drones who are of two kinds, swelling at last into the monster
drone having wings (see infra, Book ix),— are among Plato's
happiest touches. ">

There remains to be considered the great difficulty of this book
of the Republic, the so-called number of the State. This is a
puzzle almost as great as the Number of the Beast in the Book of
Revelation, and though apparently known to Aristotle, is referred
to by Cicero as a proverb of obscurity (Ep. ad Att. vii. 13, 5). And
some have imagined that there is no answer to the puzzle, and
that Plato has been practising upon his readers. But such a
deception as this is inconsistent with the manner in which
Aristotle speaks of the number (Pol. v. 12, § 7), and would have
been ridiculous to any reader of the Republic who was ac-
quainted with Greek mathematics. As little reason is there for
supposing that Plato intentionally used obscure expressions ; the
obscurity arises from our want of familiarity with the subject.
On the other hand, Plato himself indicates that he is not
altogether serious, and in describing his number as a solemn
jest of the Muses, he appears to imply some degree of satire
on the symbolical use of number. (Cp. Cratylus, passim ; Protag.
342 ff.)

Our hope of understanding the passage depends principally
on an accurate study of the words themselves ; on which a faint
light is thrown by the parallel passage in the ninth book. Another
help is the allusion in Aristotle, who makes the important remark
that the latter part of the passage (from kv «nVpiro? irv6fj.rjvt K.T.X.)
describes a solid figure1. Some further clue may be gathered
from the appearance of the Pythagorean triangle, which is denoted
by the numbers 3, 4, 5, and in which, as in every right-angled

1 Pol. v. 12, § 8 : — ' He only says that nothing is abiding, but that all things
change in a certain cycle ; and that the origin of the change is a base of
numbers which are in the ratio of 4 : 3 ; and this when combined with a figure of
five gives two harmonies ; he means when the number of this figure becomes
solid/

The Number of the State. cxxxi

triangle, the squares of the two lesser sides equal the square of the Republic
hypotenuse (32 + 42 = 52, or 9+ 16 = 25).

Plato begins by speaking of a perfect or cyclical number (cp.
Tim. 39 D), i. e. a number in which the sum of the divisors equals
the whole ; this is the divine or perfect number in which all lesser
cycles or revolutions are complete. He also speaks of a human
or imperfect number, having four terms and three intervals of
numbers which are related to one another in certain proportions ;
these he converts into figures, and finds in them when they have
been raised to the third power certain elements of number, which
give two 'harmonies,' the one square, the other oblong; but he
does not say that the square number answers to the divine, or
the oblong number to the human cycle ; nor is any intimation
given that the first or divine number represents the period of the
world, the second the period of the state, or of the human race as
Zeller supposes ; nor is the divine number afterwards mentioned
(cp. Arist.). The second is the number of generations or births,
and presides over them in the same mysterious manner in
which the stars preside over them, or in which, according to
the Pythagoreans, opportunity, justice, marriage, are repre-
sented by some number or figure. This is probably the number
216.

The explanation given in the text supposes the two harmonies
to make up the number 8000. This explanation derives a certain
plausibility from the circumstance that 8000 is the ancient number
of the Spartan citizens (Herod, vii. 34), and would be what Plato
might have called ' a number which nearly concerns the popula-
tion of a city ' (588 A) ; the mysterious disappearance of the
Spartan population may possibly have suggested to him the first
cause of his decline of States. The lesser or square ' harmony,' of
400, might be a symbol of the guardians, — the larger or oblong
' harmony,' of the people, and the numbers 3, 4, 5 might refer re-
spectively to the three orders in the State or parts of the soul, the
four virtues, the five forms of government. The harmony of the
musical scale, which is elsewhere used as a symbol of the harmony
of the state (Rep. iv. 443 D), is also indicated. For the numbers
3, 4, 5, which represent the sides of the Pythagorean triangle, also
denote the intervals of the scale.

The terms used in the statement of the problem may be

k2

cxxxii The Number of the State.

Republic explained as follows. A perfect number (reXeio?

VIII. as aireacjy stated, is one which is equal to the sum of its

INTRODUC-
TION. Thus 6, which is the first perfect or cyclical number, =

The words opot, ' terms ' or ' notes,' and aTroorao-cis, ' intervals,' are
applicable to music as well as to number and figure. IIpa>Ta> is the
'base' on which the whole calculation depends, or the 'lowest
term ' from which it can be worked out. The words dwdpevai rf
KOI dvva<rrfv6pcvai have been variously translated— ' squared and
cubed ' (Donaldson), ' equalling and equalled in power ' (Weber),
' by involution and evolution,' i. e. by raising the power and ex-
tracting the root (as in the translation). Numbers are called ' like
and unlike ' (opoiovvres re KOI dvopotovvrfs) when the factors or the
sides of the planes and cubes which they represent are or are not
in the same ratio : e. g. 8 and 27 = 23 and 33 ; and conversely.
'Waxing' (avgovrcs) numbers, called also 'increasing' (vnfpreXels),
are those which are exceeded by the sum of their divisors : e. g.
12 and 18 are less than 16 and 21. 'Waning ' (<p.6ivovrcs) numbers,
called also ' decreasing ' (/\Ai7r«s), are those which exceed the sum
of their divisors: e.g. 8 and 27 exceed 7 and 13. The words
translated ' commensurable and agreeable to one another ' (Trpoo^-
yopa KOI fora) seem to be different ways of describing the same
relation, with more or less precision. They are equivalent to
'expressible in terms having the same relation to one another,'
like the series 8, 12, 18, 27, each of which numbers is in the
relation of i^ to the preceding. The 'base,' or 'fundamental
number, which has £ added to it ' (i £) = £ or a musical fourth.
'Appovia is a ' proportion ' of numbers as of musical notes, applied
either to the parts or factors of a single number or to the relation
of one number to another. The first harmony is a 'square'
number (IO-TJV Ivdus) ; the second harmony is an ' oblong ' number
(irpopriKT)), i.e. a number representing a figure of which the
opposite sides only are equal. 'Aptd/uu dnb 8iap(Tpa>v = ' numbers
squared from ' or 'upon diameters ' ; farS* = ' rational,' i.e. omitting
fractions, appqrw*', ' irrational,' i. e. including fractions ; e. g. 49 is a
square of the rational diameter of a figure the side of which = 5 :
50, of an irrational diameter of the same. For several of

the explanations here given and for a good deal besides I am
indebted to an excellent article on the Platonic Number by
Dr. Donaldson (Proc. of the Philol. Society, vol. i. p. 81 ff. ).

The Number of the State. cxxxiii

The conclusions which he draws from these data are summed Republic
up by him as follows. Having assumed that the number of the VIIL

INTRODUC-

perfect or divine cycle is the number of the world, and the ™>N-
number of the imperfect cycle the number of the state, he
proceeds: 'The period of the world is defined by the perfect
number 6, that of the state by the cube of that number or 216,
which is the product of the last pair of terms in the Platonic
Tetractys * ; and if we take this as the basis of our computation,
we shall have two cube numbers (avgrjo-eis BwdpevaL re KCU dwa-
orevo/Ltewu), viz. 8 and 27; and the mean proportionals between
these, viz. 12 and 18, will furnish three intervals and four terms,
and these terms and intervals stand related to one another
in the sesqui-altera ratio, i. e. each term is to the preceding as f .
Now if we remember that the number 216 = 8 x 27 = 3* + 4s + 53,
and that 32 + 42 = 52, we must admit that this number implies the
numbers 3, 4, 5, to which musicians attach so much importance.
And if we combine the ratio f with the number 5, or multiply
the ratios of the sides by the hypotenuse, we shall by first squaring
and then cubing obtain two expressions, which denote the ratio of
the two last pairs of terms in the Platonic Tetractys, the former
multiplied by the square, the latter by the cube of the number 10,
the sum of the first four digits which constitute the Platonic
Tetractys.' The two dpnoviat he elsewhere explains as

follows : ' The first dppovia is "IOTJV tVa/as- IKCLTOV roo-avraW, in other
words (£ x s)2 = loo x §f. The second Appovia, a cube of the same
root, is described as 100 multipjied (a) by the rational diameter of
5 diminished by unity, i. e., as shown above, 48 : (/3) by two in-
commensurable diameters, i. e. the two first irrationals, or 2 and 3 :
and (y) by the cube of 3, or 27. Thus we have (48 + 5 + 27) 100
= loco x 23. This second harmony is to be the cube of the number
of which the former harmony is the square, and therefore must be
divided by the cube of 3. In other words, the whole expression
will be: (i), for the first harmony, ^-: (2), for the second
harmony, ^^.'

The reasons which have inclined me to agree with Dr. Donaldson
and also with Schleiermacher in supposing that 216 is the Platonic
number of births are : (i) that it coincides with the description of
the number given in the first part of the passage (eV o> irpa>T<* . . .

1 The Platonic Tetractys consisted of a series of seven terms, i, 2, 3, 4, 9, 8, 27.

cxxxiv The Niimber of the State.

Republic dire^vav) : (2) that the number 216 with its permutations would
III. have been familiar to a Greek mathematician, though unfamiliar to

INTRODUC-

TION. us : (3) that 216 is the cube of 6, and also the sum of 33, 4', 53, the
numbers 3, 4, 5 representing the Pythagorean triangle, of which
the sides when squared equal the square of the hypotenuse (32 + 4*
= 52) : (4) that it is also the period of the Pythagorean Metempsy-
chosis : (5) the three ultimate terms or bases (3, 4, 5) of which
216 is composed answer to the third, fourth, fifth in the musical
scale : (6) that the number 216 is the product of the cubes of 2 and
3, which are the two last terms in the Platonic Tetractys : (7) that
the Pythagorean triangle is said by Plutarch (de Is. et Osir., 373 E),
Proclus (super prima Eucl. iv. p. in), and Quintilian (de Musica
iii. p. 152) to be contained in this passage, so that the tradition of
the school seems to point in the same direction : (8) that the
Pythagorean triangle is called also the figure of marriage (ya/^Xtoi/

fitaypa/i/xa).

But though agreeing with Dr. Donaldson thus far, I see no
reason for supposing, as he does, that the first or perfect number
is the world, the human or imperfect number the state ; nor has
he given any proof that the second harmony is a cube. Nor do
I think that dpp^rwi/ Se §v*lv can mean 'two incommensurables,'
which he arbitrarily assumes to be 2 and 3, but rather, as the
preceding clause implies, dvelv dptdnolv OTTO dpprjrav Sia/ieVpooi/ TTffj.-

TrdSos, i. e. two square numbers based upon irrational diameters of
a figure the side of which is 5 = 50 x 2.

The greatest objection to the translation is the sense given to
the words eV/rpiroff irvdfjLT]v K.T.A., 'a base of three with a third
added to it, multiplied by 5.' In this somewhat forced manner
Plato introduces once more the numbers of the Pythagorean
triangle. But the coincidences in the numbers which follow are
in favour of the explanation. The first harmony of 400, as has
been already remarked, probably represents the rulers; the
second and oblong harmony of 7600, the people.

And here we take leave of the difficulty. The discovery of
the riddle would be useless, and would throw no light on
ancient mathematics. The point of interest is that Plato should
have used such a symbol, and that so much of the Pythagorean
spirit should have prevailed in him. His general meaning is
that divine creation is perfect, and is represented or presided

The Number of the State. cxxxv

over by a perfect or cyclical number; human generation is im- Republic
perfect, and represented or presided over by an imperfect number
or series of numbers. The number 5040, which is the number
of the citizens in the Laws, is expressly based by him on utilitarian
grounds, namely, the convenience of the number for division ; it
is also made up of the first seven digits multiplied by one another.
The contrast of the perfect and imperfect number may have been
easily suggested by the corrections of the cycle, which were made
first by Meton and secondly by Callippus ; (the latter is said to
have been a pupil of Plato). Of the degree of importance or of
exactness to be attributed to the problem, the number of the tyrant
in Book ix. (729 = 365 x 2), and the slight correction of the error in
the number 5040^12 (Laws, 771 C), may furnish a criterion.
There is nothing surprising in the circumstance that those who
were seeking for order in nature and had found order in number,
should have imagined one to give law to the other. Plato believes
in a power of number far beyond what he could see realized in the
world around him, and he knows the great influence which ' the
little matter of i, 2, 3 ' (vii. 522 C) exercises upon education. He
may even be thought to have a prophetic anticipation of the dis-
coveries of Quetelet and others, that numbers depend upon num-
bers; e.g. — in population, the numbers of births and the respective
numbers of children born of either sex, on the respective ages of
parents, i.e. on other numbers.

Steph. BOOK IX. Last of all comes the tyrannical man, about whom ANALYSIS.
5'1 we have to enquire, Whence is he, and how does he live — in
happiness or in misery ? There is, however, a previous question
of the nature and number of the appetites, which I should like to
consider first. Some of them are unlawful, and yet admit of being
chastened and weakened in various degrees by the power of reason
and law. ' What appetites do you mean ? ' I mean those which
are awake when the reasoning powers are asleep, which get up and
walk about naked without any self-respect or shame ; and there is
no conceivable folly or crime, however cruel or unnatural, of which,
in imagination, they may not be guilty. ' True,' he said ; * very
true.' But when a man's pulse beats temperately; and he has
supped on a feast of reason and come to a knowledge of himself

cxxxvi Analysis 572-574.

Republic before going to rest, and has satisfied his desires just enough to 572
ANALYSIS Prevent t^ie^r perturbing his reason, which remains clear and
luminous, and when he is free from quarrel and heat, — the visions
which he has on his bed are least irregular and abnormal. Even
in good men there is such an irregular wild-beast nature, which
peers out in sleep.

To return : — You remember what was said of the democrat ;
that he was the son of a miserly father, who encouraged the
saving desires and repressed the ornamental and expensive ones ;
presently the youth got into fine company, and began to entertain a
dislike to his father's narrow ways ; and being a better man than
the corrupters of his youth, he came to a mean, and led a life, not
of lawless or slavish passion, but of regular and successive indul-
gence. Now imagine that the youth has become a father, and has
a son who is exposed to the same temptations, and has companions
who lead him into every sort of iniquity, and parents and friends
who try to keep him right. The counsellors of evil find that their 573
only chance of retaining him is to implant in his soul a monster
drone, or love ; while other desires buzz around him and mystify
him with sweet sounds and scents, this monster love takes pos-
session of him, and puts an end to every true or modest thought
or wish. Love, like drunkenness and madness, is a tyranny ; and
the tyrannical man, whether made by nature or habit, is just a
drinking, lusting, furious sort of animal.

And how does such an one live ? * Nay, that you must tell me.'
Well then, I fancy that he will live amid revelries and harlotries,
and love will be the lord and master of the house. Many desires
require much money, and so he spends all that he has and
borrows more ; and when he has nothing the young ravens are
still in the nest in which they were hatched, crying for food. Love 574
urges them on ; and they must be gratified by force or fraud, or if
not, they become painful and troublesome; and as the new
pleasures succeed the old ones, so will the son take possession of
the goods of his parents ; if they show signs of refusing, he will
defraud and deceive them ; and if they openly resist, what then ?
' I can only say, that I should not much like to be in their place.' But,
O heavens, Adeimantus, to think that for some new-fangled and
unnecessary love he will give up his old father and mother, best
and dearest of friends, or enslave them to the fancies of the hour !

Analysis 574-577. cxxxvii

Truly a tyrannical son is a blessing to his father and mother! Republic

IX.
ANALYSIS.

IX
When there is no more to be got out of them, he turns burglar or

pickpocket, or robs a temple. Love overmasters the thoughts of
his youth, and he becomes in sober reality the monster that he

575 was sometimes in sleep. He waxes strong in all violence and
lawlessness ; and is ready for any deed of daring that will
supply the wants of his rabble-rout. In a well-ordered State
there are only a few such, and these in time of war go out and
become the mercenaries of a tyrant. But in time of peace they
stay at home and do mischief; they are the thieves, footpads,
cut-purses, man-stealers of the community ; or if they are able
to speak, they turn false-witnesses and informers. ' No small
catalogue of crimes truly, even if the perpetrators are few.' Yes, I
said ; but small and great are relative terms, and no crimes which
are committed by them approach those of the tyrant, whom this
class, growing strong and numerous, create out of themselves. If
the people yield, well and good ; but, if they resist, then, as before
he beat his father and mother, so now he beats his fatherland and
motherland, and places his mercenaries over them. Such men in
their early days live with flatterers, and they themselves flatter

576 others, in order to gain their ends ; but they soon discard their
followers when they have no longer any need of them ; they are
always either masters or servants, — the joys of friendship are
unknown to them. And they are utterly treacherous and unjust,
if the nature of justice be at all understood by us. They realize
our dream ; and he who is the most of a tyrant by nature, and
leads the life of a tyrant for the longest time, will be the worst
of them, and being the worst of them, will also be the most
miserable.

Like man, like State, — the tyrannical man will answer to tyranny,
which is the extreme opposite of the royal State ; for one is the
best and the other the worst. But which is the happier ? Great
and terrible as the tyrant may appear enthroned amid his satel-
lites, let us not be afraid to go in and ask ; and the answer is, that
the monarchical is the happiest, and the tyrannical the most

577 miserable of States. And may we not ask the same question
about the men themselves, requesting some one to look into them
who is able to penetrate the inner nature of man, and will not be
panic-struck by the vain pomp of tyranny ? I will suppose that he

cxxxviii Analysis 577-579.

Republic is one who has lived with him, and has seen him in family life,
™ or perhaps in the hour of trouble and danger.

ANALYSIS.

Assuming that we ourselves are the impartial judge for whom
we seek, let us begin by comparing the individual and State, and '
ask first of all, whether the State is likely to be free or enslaved —
Will there not be a little freedom and a great deal of slavery ? And
the freedom is of the bad, and the slavery of the good ; and this
applies to the man as well as to the State ; for his soul is full of
meanness and slavery, and the better part is enslaved to the
worse. He cannot do what he would, and his mind is full of con-
fusion ; he is the very reverse of a freeman. The State will be 578
poor and full of misery and sorrow ; and the man's soul will also
be poor and full of sorrows, and he will be the most miserable of
men. No, not the most miserable, for there is yet a more miser-
able. ' Who is that ? ' The tyrannical man who has the misfortune
also to become a public tyrant. ' There I suspect that you are
right.' Say rather, ' I am sure ;' conjecture is out of place in an
enquiry of this nature. He is like a wealthy owner of slaves,
only he has more of them than any private individual. You will
say, ' The owners of slaves are not generally in any fear of them.'
But why ? Because the whole city is in a league which protects
the individual. Suppose however that one of these owners and
his household is carried off by a god into a wilderness, where there
are no freemen to help him — will he not be in an agony of terror ?
— will he not be compelled to flatter his slaves and to promise them 579
many things sore against his will ? And suppose the same god
who carried him off were to surround him with neighbours who
declare that no man ought to have slaves, and that the owners of
them should be punished with death. * Still worse and worse !
He will be in the midst of his enemies.' And is not our tyrant
such a captive soul, who is tormented by a swarm of passions
which he cannot indulge ; living indoors always like a woman, and
jealous of those who can go out and see the world ?

Having so many evils, will not the most miserable of men be
still more miserable in a public station ? Master of others when
he is not master of himself; like a sick man who is compelled to be
an athlete ; the meanest of slaves and the most abject of flatterers ;
wanting all things, and never able to satisfy his desires ; always in
fear and distraction, like the State of which he is the representative.

Analysis 580-583. cxxxix

580 His jealous, hateful, faithless temper grows worse with com- Republic
mand ; he is more and more faithless, envious, unrighteous, — the

most wretched of men, a misery to himself and to others. And
so let us have a final trial and proclamation ; need we hire a
herald, or shall I proclaim the result ? < Make the proclamation
yourself.' The son of Ariston (the best] is of opinion that the best
and justest of men is also the happiest^ and that this is he who is the
most royal master of himself j and that the unjust man is he who is
the greatest tyrant of himself and of his State. And I add further —
* seen or unseen by gods or men?

This is our first proof. The second is derived from the three
kinds of pleasure, which answer to the three elements of the soul

581 — reason, passion, desire ; under which last is comprehended
avarice as well as sensual appetite, while passion includes am-
bition, party-feeling, love of reputation. Reason, again, is solely
directed to the attainment of truth, and careless of money and
reputation. In accordance with the difference of men's natures,
one of these three principles is in the ascendant, and they have
their several pleasures corresponding to them. Interrogate now
the three natures, and each one will be found praising his own
pleasures and depreciating those of others. The money-maker
will contrast the vanity of knowledge with the solid advantages of
wealth. The ambitious man will despise knowledge which brings
no honour ; whereas the philosopher will regard only the fruition
of truth, and will call other pleasures necessary rather than good.

582 Now, how shall we decide between them ? Is there any better
criterion than experience and knowledge? And which of the
three has the truest knowledge and the widest experience ? The
experience of youth makes the philosopher acquainted with the
two kinds of desire, but the avaricious and the ambitious man never
taste the pleasures of truth and wisdom. Honour he has equally
with them; they are 'judged of him,' but he is 'not judged of
them,' for they never attain to the knowledge of true being. And
his instrument is reason, whereas their standard is only wealth
and honour ; and if by reason we are to judge, his good will be the
truest. And so we arrive at the result that the pleasure of the
rational part .of the soul, and a life passed in such pleasure is the

583 pleasantest. He who has a right to judge judges thus. Next comes
the life of ambition, and, in the third place, that of money-making.

cxl Analysis 583-585.

Republic Twice has the just man overthrown the unjust— once more, as in
ANALYSIS. an OtymPian contest, first offering up a prayer to the saviour Zeus,
let him try a fall. A wise man whispers to me that the pleasures
of the wise are true and pure ; all others are a shadow only. Let
us examine this : Is not pleasure opposed to pain, and is there not
a mean state which is neither ? When a man is sick, nothing is
more pleasant to him than health. But this he never found out
while he was well. In pain he desires only to cease from pain; on
the other hand, when he is in an ecstasy of pleasure, rest is painful
to him. Thus rest or cessation is both pleasure and pain. But
can that which is neither become both ? Again, pleasure and pain
are motions, and the absence of them is rest ; but if so, how can 584
the absence of either of them be the other ? Thus we are led to
infer that the contradiction is an appearance only, and witchery of
the senses. And these are not the only pleasures, for there are
others which have no preceding pains. Pure pleasure then is not
the absence of pain, nor pure pain the absence of pleasure ;
although most of the pleasures which reach the mind through
the body are reliefs of pain, and have not only their reactions when
they depart, but their anticipations before they come. They can
be best described in a simile. There is in nature an upper, lower,
and middle region, and he who passes from the lower to the
middle imagines that he is going up and is already in the upper
world ; and if he were taken back again would think, and truly
think, that he was descending. All this arises out of his ignorance
of the true upper, middle, and lower regions. And a like confu-
sion happens with pleasure and pain, and with many other things.
The man who compares grey with black, calls grey white ; and 585
the man who compares absence of pain with pain, calls the absence
of pain pleasure. Again, hunger and thirst are inanitions of the
body, ignorance and folly of the soul ; and food is the satisfaction
of the one, knowledge of the other. Now which is the purer
satisfaction — that of eating and drinking, or that of knowledge?
Consider the matter thus : The satisfaction of that which has more
existence is truer than of that which has less. The invariable and
immortal has a more real existence than the variable and mortal,
and has a corresponding measure of knowledge and truth. The
soul, again, has more existence and truth and knowledge than the
body, and is therefore more really satisfied and has a more

Analysis 586-588. cxli

586 natural pleasure. Those who feast only on earthly food, are Republic

Ty

always going at random up to the middle and down again ; but
they never pass into the true upper world, or have a taste of true
pleasure. They are like fatted beasts, full of gluttony and sensua-
lity, and ready to kill one another by reason of their insatiable
lust ; for they are not filled with true being, and their vessel is
leaky (cp. Gorgias, 243 A, foil.). Their pleasures are mere
shadows of pleasure, mixed with pain, coloured and intensified by
contrast, and therefore intensely desired ; and men go fighting
about them, as Stesichorus says that the Greeks fought about the
shadow of Helen at Troy, because they know not the truth.

The same may be said of the passionate element :— the desires
of the ambitious soul, as well as of the covetous, have an inferior
satisfaction. Only when under the guidance of reason do either of

587 the other principles do their own business or attain the pleasure
which is natural to them. When not attaining, they compel the
other parts of the soul to pursue a shadow of pleasure which is not
theirs. And the more distant they are from philosophy and
reason, the more distant they will be from law and order, and
the more illusive will be their pleasures. The desires of love
and tyranny are the farthest from law, and those of the king
are nearest to it. There is one genuine pleasure, and two
spurious ones : the tyrant goes beyond even the latter ; he has
run away altogether from law and reason. Nor can the measure
of his inferiority be told, except in a figure. The tyrant is the
third removed from the oligarch, and has therefore, not a shadow
of his pleasure, but the shadow of a shadow only. The oligarch,
again, is thrice removed from the king, and thus we get the for-
mula 3x3, which is the number of a surface, representing the
shadow which is the tyrant's pleasure, and if you like to cube
this f number of the beast,' you will find that the measure of
the difference amounts to 729 ; the king is 729 times more happy
than the tyrant. And this extraordinary number is nearly equal
to the number of days and nights in a year (365 x 2 = 730) ; and

588 is therefore concerned with human life. This is the interval
between a good and bad man in happiness only : what must
be the difference between them in comeliness of life and virtue !

Perhaps you may remember some one saying at the beginning
of our discussion that the unjust man was profited if he had the

cxlii Analysis 588-590.

Republic reputation of justice. Now that we know the nature of justice
ANALYSIS and injusticei let us make an image of the soul, which will
personify his words. First of all, fashion a multitudinous beast,
having a ring of heads of all manner of animals, tame and wild,
and able to produce and change them at pleasure. Suppose
now another form of a lion, and another of a man ; the second
smaller than the first, the third than the second ; join them
together and cover them with a human skin, in which they are
completely concealed. When this has been done, let us tell
the supporter of injustice that he is feeding up the beasts and 589
starving the man. The maintainer of justice, on the other hand,
is trying to strengthen the man ; he is nourishing the gentle
principle within him, and making an alliance with the lion heart,
in order that he may be able to keep down the many-headed
hydra, and bring all into unity with each other and with them-
selves. Thus in every point of view, whether in relation to
pleasure, honour, or advantage, the just man is right, and the
unjust wrong.

But now, let us reason with the unjust, who is not intentionally
in error. Is not the noble that which subjects the beast to the
man, or rather to the God in man ; the ignoble, that which sub-
jects the man to the beast ? And if so, who would receive gold on
condition that he was to degrade the noblest part of himself under
the worst? — who would sell his son or daughter into the hands
of brutal and evil men, for any amount of money ? And will
he sell his own fairer and diviner part without any compunction
to the most godless and foul ? Would he not be worse than 590
Eriphyle, who sold her husband's life for a necklace ? And in-
temperance is the letting loose of the multiform monster, and
pride and sullenness are the growth and increase of the lion
and serpent element, while luxury and effeminacy are caused
by a too great relaxation of spirit. Flattery and meanness again
arise when the spirited element is subjected to avarice, and the
lion is habituated to become a monkey. The real disgrace of
handicraft arts is, that those who are engaged in them have
to flatter, instead of mastering their desires ; therefore we say
that they should be placed under the control of the better prin-
ciple in another because they have none in themselves ; not, as
Thrasymachus imagined, to the injury of the subjects, but for

Analysis 591, 592. cxliii

their good. And our intention in educating the young, is to Republic

591 give them self-control; the law desires to nurse up in them a ANALY'SIS
higher principle, and when they have acquired this, they may

go their ways.

' What, then, shall a man profit, if he gain the whole world '
and become more and more wicked ? Or what shall he profit by
escaping discovery, if the concealment of evil prevents the cure ?
If he had been punished, the brute within him would have been
silenced, and the gentler element liberated ; and he would have
united temperance, justice, and wisdom in his soul — a union
better far than any combination of bodily gifts. The man of
understanding will honour knowledge above all ; in the next place
he will keep under his body, not only for the sake of health
and strength, but in order to attain the most perfect harmony
of body and soul. In the acquisition of riches, too, he will aim
at order and harmony ; he will not desire to heap up wealth
without measure, but he will fear that the increase of wealth
will disturb the constitution of his own soul. For the same

592 reason he will only accept such honours as will make him a
better man ; any others he will decline. ' In that case,' said he,
' he will never be a politician.' Yes, but he will, in his own city ;
though probably not in his native country, unless by some divine
accident. ' You mean that he will be a citizen of the ideal city,
which has no place upon earth.' But in heaven, I replied,
there is a pattern of such a city, and he who wishes may order
his life after that image. Whether such a state is or ever will
be matters not; he will act according to that pattern and no
other

The most noticeable points in the 9th Book of the Republic INTRODUC-
are : — (i) the account of pleasure ; (2) the number of the interval
which divides the king from the tyrant ; (3) the pattern which is in
heaven.

i. Plato's account of pleasure is remarkable for moderation,
and in this respect contrasts with the later Platonists and the
views which are attributed to them by Aristotle. He is not,
like the Cynics, opposed to all pleasure, but rather desires that
the several parts of the soul shall have their natural satisfac-
tion ; he even agrees with the Epicureans in describing pleasure

cxliv Plato 's Account of pleasure.

Republic as something more than the absence of pain. This is proved
INTRODUC- by tne circumstance tnat there are pleasures which have no
TION. antecedent pains (as he also remarks in the Philebus), such as
the pleasures of smell, and also the pleasures of hope and an-
ticipation. In the previous book (pp. 558, 559) he had made the
distinction between necessary and unnecessary pleasure, which is
repeated by Aristotle, and he now observes that there are a
further class of ' wild beast ' pleasures, corresponding to Aris-
totle's 0T)pioTT)s. He dwells upon the relative and unreal character
of sensual pleasures and the illusion which arises out of the
contrast of pleasure and pain, pointing out the superiority of
the pleasures of reason, which are at rest, over the fleeting
pleasures of sense and emotion. The pre-eminence of royal
pleasure is shown by the fact that reason is able to form, a
judgment of the lower pleasures, while the two lower parts of
the soul are incapable of judging the pleasures of reason. Thus,
in his treatment of pleasure, as in many other subjects, the
philosophy of Plato is ' sawn up into quantities ' by Aristotle ;
the analysis which was originally made by him became in the
next generation the foundation of further technical distinctions.
Both in Plato and Aristotle we note the illusion under which
the ancients fell of regarding the transience of pleasure as a proof
of its unreality, and of confounding the permanence of the in-
tellectual pleasures with the unchangeableness of the knowledge
from which they are derived. Neither do we like to admit that
the pleasures of knowledge, though more elevating, are not
more lasting than other pleasures, and are almost equally de-
pendent on the accidents of our bodily state (cp. Introd. to
Philebus).

2. The number of the interval which separates the king from
the tyrant, and royal from tyrannical pleasures, is 729, the cube
of 9, which Plato characteristically designates as a number con-
cerned with human life, because nearly equivalent to the number
of days and nights in the year. He is desirous of proclaiming
that the interval between them is immeasurable, and invents a
formula to give expression to his idea. Those who spoke of
justice as a cube, of virtue as an art of measuring (Prot. 357 A),
saw no inappropriateness in conceiving the soul under the figure
of a line, or the pleasure of the tyrant as separated from the

* The kingdom of heaven is within you' cxlv

pleasure of the king by the numerical interval of 729. And in Republic
modern times we sometimes use metaphorically what Plato lNTROpUC
employed as a philosophical formula. ' It is not easy to estimate TION-
the loss of the tyrant, except perhaps in this way,' says Plato.
So we might say, that although the life of a good man is not
to be compared to that of a bad man, yet you may measure the
diiference between them by valuing one minute of the one at
an hour of the other (' One day in thy courts is better than a
thousand '), or you might say that ' there is an infinite diiference.'
But this is not so much as saying, in homely phrase, * They are
a thousand miles asunder.' And accordingly Plato finds the
natural vehicle of his thoughts in a progression of numbers;
this arithmetical formula he draws out with the utmost serious-
ness, and both here and in the number of generation seems to
find an additional proof of the truth of his speculation in forming
the number into a geometrical figure ; just as persons in our own
day are apt to fancy that a statement is verified when it has been
only thrown into an abstract form. In speaking of the number
729 as proper to human life, he probably intended to intimate
that one year of the tyrannical = 12 hours of the royal life.

The simple observation that the comparison of two similar solids
is effected by the comparison of the cubes of their sides, is the
mathematical groundwork of this fanciful expression. There is
some difficulty in explaining the steps by which the number
729 is obtained ; the oligarch is removed in the third degree
from the royal and aristocratical, and the tyrant in the third
degree from the oligarchical ; but we have to arrange the terms
as the sides of a square and to count the oligarch twice over,
thus reckoning them not as = 5 but as = 9. The square of 9 is
passed lightly over as only a step towards the cube.

3. Towards the close of the Republic, Plato seems to be more
and more convinced of the ideal character of his own specula-
tions. At the end of the 9th Book the pattern which is in heaven
takes the place of the city of philosophers on earth. The vision
which has received form and substance at his hands, is now
discovered to be at a distance. And yet this distant kingdom
is also the rule of man's life (Bk. vii. 540 E). (' Say not lo !
here, or lo ! there, for the kingdom of God is within you.') Thus
a note is struck which prepares for the revelation of a future

1

cxlvi Analysis 595-597.

Republic life in the following Book. But the future life is present still ; the
IX.

INTRODUC-

T y

ideal of politics is to be realized in the individual.

ANALYSIS. BOOK X. Many things pleased me in the order of our State, Steph.
but there was nothing which I liked better than the regulation 595
about poetry. The division of the soul throws a new light on
our exclusion of imitation. I do not mind telling you in confi-
dence that all poetry is an outrage on the understanding, unless
the hearers have that balm of knowledge which heals error.
I have loved Homer ever since I was a boy, and even now he
appears to me to be the great master of tragic poetry. But
much as I love the man, I love truth more, and therefore I
must speak out : and first of all, will you explain what is imita-
tion, for really I do not understand ? ' How likely then that I
should understand ! ' That might very well be, for the duller often 596
sees better than the keener eye. 'True, but in your presence
I can hardly venture to say what I think.' Then suppose that
we begin in our old fashion, with the doctrine of universals.
Let us assume the existence of beds and tables. There is one
idea of a bed, or of a table, which the maker of each had in
his mind when making them ; he did not make the ideas of beds
and tables, but he made beds and tables according to the ideas.
And is there not a maker of the works of all workmen, who
makes not only vessels but plants and animals, himself, the
earth and heaven, and things in heaven and under the earth?
He makes the Gods also. ' He must be a wizard indeed ! ' But
do you not see that there is a sense in which you could dp
the same ? You have only to take a mirror, and catch the
reflection of the sun, and the earth, or anything else— there now
you have made them. ' Yes, but only in appearance.' Exactly so ;
and the painter is such a creator as you are with the mirror, and
he is even more unreal than the carpenter; although neither
the carpenter nor any other artist can be supposed to make 597
the absolute bed. ' Not if philosophers may be believed.' Nor
need we wonder that his bed has but an imperfect relation to
the truth. Reflect : — Here are three beds ; one in nature, which
is made by God ; another, which is made by the carpenter ; and
the third, by the painter. God only made one, nor could he
have made more than one; for if there had been two, there

Analysis 597-600. cxlvii

would always have been a third — more absolute and abstract Republic
than either, under which they would have been included. We X'

ANALYSIS.

may therefore conceive God to be the natural maker of the bed,
and in a lower sense the carpenter is also the maker ; but the
painter is rather the imitator of what the other two make ; he
has to do with a creation which is thrice removed from reality.
And the tragic poet is an imitator, and, like every other imitator,
is thrice removed from the king and from the truth. The painter

598 imitates not the original bed, but the bed made by the carpenter.
And this, without being really different, appears to be different,
and has many points of view, of which only one is caught by
the painter, who represents everything because he represents
a piece of everything, and that piece an image. And he can
paint any other artist, although he knows nothing of their arts ; and
this with sufficient skill to deceive children or simple people.
Suppose now that somebody came to us and told us, how he
had met a man who knew all that everybody knows, and better
than anybody : — should we not infer him to be a simpleton who,
having no discernment of truth and falsehood, had met with a
wizard or enchanter, whom he fancied to be all-wise ? And when
we hear persons saying that Homer and the tragedians know
all the arts and all the virtues, must we not infer that they are

599 under a similar delusion ? they do not see that the poets are
imitators, and that their creations are only imitations. 'Very
true.' But if a person could create as well as imitate, he would
rather leave some permanent work and not an imitation only;
he would rather be the receiver than the giver of praise ? ' Yes,
for then he would have more honour and advantage.'

Let us now interrogate Homer and the poets. Friend Homer,
say I to him, I am not going to ask you about medicine, or any
art to which your poems incidentally refer, but about their
main subjects— war, military tactics, politics. If you are only
twice and not thrice removed from the truth— not an imitator
or an image-maker, please to inform us what good you have ever
done to mankind ? Is there any city which professes to have
received laws from you, as Sicily and Italy have from Charondas,

600 Sparta from Lycurgus, Athens from Solon ? Or was any war
ever carried on by your counsels ? or is any invention attributed
to you, as there is to Thales and Anacharsis ? Or is there any

la

cxlviii Analysis 600-602.

Republic Homeric way of life, such as the Pythagorean was, in which you
ANALYSIS ^nstructe^ men, and which is called after you ? * No, indeed ;
and Creophylus [Flesh-child] was even more unfortunate in his
breeding than he was in his name, if, as tradition says, Homer in
his lifetime was allowed by him and his other friends to starve.'
Yes, but could this ever have happened if Homer had really
been the educator of Hellas? Would he not have had many
devoted followers? If Protagoras and Prodicus can persuade
their contemporaries that no one can manage house or State
without them, is it likely that Homer and Hesiod would have
been allowed to go about as beggars— I mean if they had really
been able to do the world any good?— would not men have
compelled them to stay where they were, or have followed
them about in order to get education? But they did not; and
therefore we may infer that Homer and all the poets are only
imitators, who do but imitate the appearances of things. For 60 1
as a painter by a knowledge of figure and colour can paint a
cobbler without any practice in cobbling, so the poet can de-
lineate any art in the colours of language, and give harmony and
rhythm to the cobbler and also to the general ; and you know
how mere narration, when deprived of the ornaments of metre,
is like a face which has lost the beauty of youth and never had
any other. Once more, the imitator has no knowledge of reality,
but only of appearance. The painter paints, and the artificer
makes a bridle and reins, but neither understands the use of
them — the knowledge of this is confined to the horseman ; and
so of other things. Thus we have three arts : one of use, an-
other of invention, a third of imitation ; and the user furnishes
the rule to the two others. The flute-player will know the
good and bad flute, and the maker will put faith in him ; but
the imitator will neither know nor have faith — neither science 602
nor true opinion can be ascribed to him. Imitation, then, is
devoid of knowledge, being only a kind of play or sport, and
the tragic and epic poets are imitators in the highest degree.

And now let us enquire, what is the faculty in man which
answers to imitation. Allow me to explain my meaning : Ob-
jects are differently seen when in the water and when out of
the water, when near and when at a distance ; and the painter
or juggler makes use of this variation to impose upon us. And

Analysis 602-605. cxlix

the art of measuring and weighing and calculating comes in to Republic
save our bewildered minds from the power of appearance ; for, '

603 as we were saying, two contrary opinions of the same about
the same and at the same time, cannot both of them be true.
But which of them is true is determined by the art of calcula-
tion ; and this is allied to the better faculty in the soul, as the
arts of imitation are to the worse. And the same holds of the
ear as well as of the eye, of poetry as well as painting. The
imitation is of actions voluntary or involuntary, in which there
is an expectation of a good or bad result, and present experience
of pleasure and pain. But is a man in harmony with himself
when he is the subject of these conflicting influences ? Is there
not rather a contradiction in him ? Let me further ask, whether

604 he is more likely to control sorrow when he is alone or when
he is in company. 'In the latter case.' Feeling would lead
him to indulge his sorrow, but reason and law control him
and enjoin patience ; since he cannot know whether his afflic-
tion is good or evil, and no human thing is of any great
consequence, while sorrow is certainly a hindrance to good
counsel. For when we stumble, we should not, like children,
make an uproar; we should take the measures which reason
prescribes, not raising a lament, but finding a cure. And the
better part of us is ready to follow reason, while the irrational
principle is full of sorrow and distraction at the recollection of
our troubles. Unfortunately, however, this latter furnishes the
chief materials of the imitative arts. Whereas reason is ever
in repose and cannot easily be displayed, especially to a mixed

'605 multitude who have no experience of her. Thus the poet is
like the painter in two ways : first he paints an inferior degree
of truth, and secondly, he is concerned with an inferior part
of the soul. He indulges the feelings, while he enfeebles the
reason ; and we refuse to allow him to have authority over the
mind of man ; for he has no measure of greater and less, and
is a maker of images and very far gone from truth.

But we have not yet mentioned the heaviest count in the
indictment— the power which poetry has of injuriously exciting
the feelings. When we hear some passage in which a hero
laments his sufferings at tedious length, you know that we
sympathize with him and praise the poet ; and yet in our own

cl Analysis 605-608.

Republic sorrows such an exhibition of feeling is regarded as effeminate
ANALYSIS and unmanlv (CP- I°n> 535 E). Now, ought a man to feel pleasure
in seeing another do what he hates and abominates in himself?
Is he not giving way to a sentiment which in his own case he 606
would control? — he is off his guard because the sorrow is an-
other's ; and he thinks that he may indulge his feelings without
disgrace, and will be the gainer by the pleasure. But the in-
evitable consequence is that he who begins by weeping at the
sorrows of others, will end by weeping at his own. The same
is true of comedy, — you may often laugh at buffoonery which
you would be ashamed to utter, and the love of coarse merri-
ment on the stage will at last turn you into a buffoon at home.
Poetry feeds and waters the passions and desires ; she lets
them rule instead of ruling them. And therefore, when we
hear the encomiasts of Homer affirming that he is the educator
of Hellas, and that all life should be regulated by his precepts, 607
we may allow the excellence of their intentions, and agree with
them in thinking Homer a great poet and tragedian. But we
shall continue to prohibit all poetry which goes beyond hymns
to the Gods and praises of famous men. Not pleasure and pain,
but law and reason shall rule in our State.

These are our grounds for expelling poetry ; but lest she
should charge us with discourtesy, let us also make an apology
to her. We will remind her that there is an ancient quarrel
between poetry and philosophy, of which there are many traces
in the writings of the poets, such as the saying of ' the she-dog,
yelping at her mistress,' and 'the philosophers who are ready
to circumvent Zeus,' and 'the philosophers who are paupers.'
Nevertheless we bear her no ill-will, and will gladly allow her to
return upon condition that she makes a defence of herself in
verse ; and her supporters who are not poets may speak in prose.
We confess her charms; but if she cannot show that she is
useful as well as delightful, like rational lovers, we must re-
nounce our love, though endeared to us by early associations.
Having come to years of discretion, we know that poetry is not 608
truth, and that a man should be careful how he introduces her
to that state or constitution which he himself is ; for there is a
mighty issue at stake — no less than the good or evil of a human
soul. And it is not worth while to forsake justice and virtue

A na lysis 608-611. cl L

for the attractions of poetry, any more than for the sake of Republic
honour or wealth. 'I agree with you.' AKALYSIS.

And yet the rewards of virtue are greater far than I have
described. ' And can we conceive things greater still ? ' Not,
perhaps, in this brief span of life : but should an immortal being
care about anything short of eternity? 'I do not understand
what you mean ? ' Do you not know that the soul is immortal I
1 Surely you are not prepared to prove that ? * Indeed I am,
' Then let me hear this argument, of which you make so light*

609 You would admit that everything has an element of good and
of evil In all things there is an inherent corruption ; and if this
cannot destroy them, nothing else will. The soul too has her
own corrupting principles, which are injustice, intemperance,
cowardice, and the like. But none of these destroy the soul in
the same sense that disease destroys the body. The soul may be
full of all iniquities, but is not, by reason of them, brought any
nearer to death. Nothing which was not destroyed from within
ever perished by external affection of evil. The body, which

610 is one thing, cannot be destroyed by food, which is another,
unless the badness of the food is communicated to the body.
Neither can the soul, which is one thing, be corrupted by the
body, which is another, unless she herself is infected. And
as no bodily evil can infect the soul, neither can any bodily
evil, whether disease or violence, or any other destroy the soul,
unless it can be shown to render her unholy and unjust. But
no one will ever prove that the souls of men become more un-
just when they die. If a person has the audacity to say the
contrary, the answer is — Then why do criminals require the
hand of the executioner, and not die of themselves? 'Truly/
he said, 'injustice would not be very terrible if it brought a
cessation of evil ; but I rather believe that the injustice which
murders others may tend to quicken and stimulate the life of the
unjust.' You are quite right. If sin which is her own natural and
inherent evil cannot destroy the soul, hardly will anything else

6 1 I destroy her. But the soul which cannot be destroyed either by
internal or external evil must be immortal and everlasting. And
if this be true, souls will always exist in the same number. They
cannot diminish, because they cannot be destroyed ; nor yet in-
crease, for the increase of the immortal must come from some-

clii Analysis 611-614.

Republic thing mortal, and so all would end in immortality. Neither is
ANAIYSIS. the soul var^^e anc* diverse ; for that which is immortal must
be of the fairest and simplest composition. If we would conceive
her truly, and so behold justice and injustice in their own
nature, she must be viewed by the light of reason pure as at
birth, or as she is reflected in philosophy when holding con-
verse with the divine and immortal and eternal. In her present
condition we see her only like the sea-god Glaucus, bruised and
maimed in the sea which is the world, and covered with shells 612
and stones which are incrusted upon her from the entertain-
ments of earth.

Thus far, as the argument required, we have said nothing of
the rewards and honours which the poets attribute to justice ;
we have contented ourselves with showing that justice in her-
self is best for the soul in herself, even if a man should put on
a Gyges' ring and have the helmet of Hades too. And now
you shall repay me what you borrowed ; and I will enumerate
the rewards of justice in life and after death. I granted, for
the sake of argument, as you will remember, that evil might
perhaps escape the knowledge of Gods and men, although this
was really impossible. And since I have shown that justice
has reality, you must grant me also that she has the palm of
appearance. In the first place, the just man is known to the
Gods, and he is therefore the friend of the Gods, and he will 613
receive at their hands every good, always excepting such evil
as is the necessary consequence of former sins. All things end
in good to him, either in life or after death, even what appears
to be evil ; for the Gods have a care of him who desires to be
in their likeness. And what shall we say of men ? Is not
honesty the best policy ? The clever rogue makes a great start
at first, but breaks down before he reaches the goal, and slinks
away in dishonour ; whereas the true runner perseveres to the
end, and receives the prize. And you must allow me to repeat
all the blessings which you attributed to the fortunate unjust —
they bear rule in the city, they marry and give in marriage to
whom they will ; and the evils which you attributed to the un-
fortunate just, do really fall in the end on the unjust, although,
as you implied, their sufferings are better veiled in silence.

But all the blessings of this present life are as nothing when 614

Analysis 614-616, cliii

compared with those which await good men after death. 'I Republic
should like to hear about them.' Come, then, and I will tell you

ANALYSIS.

the story of Er, the son of Armenius, a valiant man. He was
supposed to have died in battle, but ten days afterwards his body
was found untouched by corruption and sent home for burial.
On the twelfth day he was placed on the funeral pyre and there
he came to life again, and told what he had seen in the world
below. He said that his soul went with a great company to a
place, in which there were two chasms near together in the earth
beneath, and two corresponding chasms in the heaven above.
And there were judges sitting in the intermediate space, bidding
the just ascend by the heavenly way on the right hand, having
the seal of their judgment set upon them before, while the unjust,
having the seal behind, were bidden to descend by the way on the
left hand. Him they told to look and listen, as he was to be their
messenger to men from the world below. And he beheld and saw
the souls departing after judgment at either chasm ; some who
came from earth, were worn and travel-stained; others, who
came from heaven, were clean and bright. They seemed glad to
meet and rest awhile in the meadow ; here they discoursed with

615 one another of what they had seen in the other world. Those
who came from earth wept at the remembrance of their sorrows,
but the spirits from above spoke of glorious sights and heavenly
bliss. He said that for every evil deed they were punished ten-
fold— now the journey was of a thousand years' duration, because
the life of man was reckoned as a hundred years— and the re-
wards of virtue were in the same proportion. He added some-
thing hardly worth repeating about infants dying almost as soon
as they were born. Of parricides and other murderers he had
tortures still more terrible to narrate. He was present when
one of the spirits asked— Where is Ardiaeus the Great ? (This
Ardiaeus was a cruel tyrant, who had murdered his father, and his
elder brother, a thousand years before.) Another spirit answered,
' He comes not hither, and will never come. And I myself,' he
added, ' actually saw this terrible sight. At the entrance of the
chasm, as we were about to reascend, Ardiaeus appeared, and
some other sinners— most of whom had been tyrants, but not all—
and just as they fancied that they were returning to life, the chasm

616 gave a roar, and then wild, fiery-looking men who knew the

cliv Analysis 616, 617.

Republic meaning of the sound, seized him and several others, and bound

•y

. them hand and foot and threw them down, and dragged them

ANALYSIS.

along at the side of the road, lacerating them and carding them
like wool, and explaining to the passers-by, that they were going
to be cast into hell.' The greatest terror of the pilgrims as-
cending was lest they should hear the voice, and when there
was silence one by one they passed up with joy. To these
sufferings there were corresponding delights.

On the eighth day the souls of the pilgrims resumed their
journey, and in four days came to a spot whence they looked
down upon a line of light, in colour like a rainbow, only brighter
and clearer. One day more brought them to the place, and they
saw that this was the column of light which binds together the
whole universe. The ends of the column were fastened to heaven,
and from them hung the distaff of Necessity, on which all the
heavenly bodies turned — the hook and spindle were of adamant,
and the whorl of a mixed substance. The whorl was in form
like a number of boxes fitting into one another with their edges
turned upwards, making together a single whorl which was
pierced by the spindle. The outermost had the rim broadest,
and the inner whorls were smaller and smaller, and had their
rims narrower. The largest (the fixed stars) was spangled — the
seventh (the sun) was brightest — the eighth (the moon) shone by
the light of the seventh— the second and fifth (Saturn and Mercury) 617
were most like one another and yellower than the eighth — the
third (Jupiter) had the whitest light — the fourth (Mars) was red —
the sixth (Venus) was in whiteness second. The whole had one
motion, but while this was revolving in one direction the seven
inner circles were moving in the opposite, with various degrees
of swiftness and slowness. The spindle turned on the knees of
Necessity, and a Siren stood hymning upon each circle, while
Lachesis, Clotho, and Atropos, the daughters of Necessity, sat on
thrones at equal intervals, singing of past, present, and future,
responsive to the music of the Sirens ; Clotho from time to time
guiding the outer circle with a touch of her right hand ; Atropos
with her left hand touching and guiding the inner circles ; Lachesis
in turn putting forth her hand from time to time to guide both of
them. On their arrival the pilgrims went to Lachesis, and there
was an interpreter who arranged them, and taking from her

Analysis 617—619. civ

knees lots, and samples of lives, got up into a pulpit and said : Republic
'Mortal souls, hear the words of Lachesis, the daughter of Ne-

ANALYSIS.

cessity. A new period of mortal life has begun, and you may
choose what divinity you please ; the responsibility of choosing

618 is with you — God is blameless.' After speaking thus, he cast the
lots among them and each one took up the lot which fell near him.
He then placed on the ground before them the samples of lives,
many more than the souls present ; and there were all sorts of lives,
of men and of animals. There were tyrannies ending in misery
and exile, and lives of men and women famous for their different
qualities ; and also mixed lives, made up of wealth and poverty,
sickness and health. Here, Glaucon, is the great risk of human
life, and therefore the whole of education should be directed to
the acquisition of such a knowledge as will teach a man to refuse
the evil and choose the good. He should know all the combina-
tions which occur in life — of beauty with poverty or with wealth,
— of knowledge with external goods,— and at last choose with
reference to the nature of the soul, regarding that only as the
better life which makes men better, and leaving the rest. And

619 a man must take with him an iron sense of truth and right into the
world below, that there too he may remain undazzled by wealth
or the allurements of evil, and be determined to avoid the extremes
and choose the mean. For this, as the messenger reported the
interpreter to have said, is the true happiness of man. ; and any
one, as he proclaimed, may, if he choose with understanding, have
a good lot, even though he come last. 'Let not the first be
careless in his choice, nor the last despair.' He spoke ; and when
he had spoken, he who had drawn the first lot chose, a tyranny :
he did not see that he was fated to devour his own children — and
when he discovered his mistake, he wept and beat his breast,
blaming chance and the Gods and anybody rather than himself.
He was one of those who had come from heaven, and in his
previous life had been a citizen of a well-ordered State, but he
had only habit and no philosophy. Like many another, he made
a bad choice, because he had no experience of life ; whereas those
who came from earth and had seen trouble were not in such a
hurry to choose. But if a man had followed philosophy while
upon earth, and had been moderately fortunate in his lot, he
might not only be happy here, but his pilgrimage both from and

clvi Analysis 619-621.

Republic to this world would be smooth and heavenly. Nothing was more
ANALYSIS. cur*ous than the sPectacle of the choice, at once sad and laughable
and wonderful ; most of the souls only seeking to avoid their own
condition in a previous life. He saw the soul of Orpheus changing 620
into a swan because he would not be born of a woman ; there was
Thamyras becoming a nightingale ; musical birds, like the swan,
choosing to be men ; the twentieth soul, which was that of Ajax,
preferring the life of a lion to that of a man, in remembrance of the
injustice which was done to him in the judgment of the arms;
and Agamemnon, from a like enmity to human nature, passing
into an eagle. About the middle was the soul of Atalanta choosing
the honours of an athlete, and next to her Epeus taking the
nature of a workwoman ; among the last was Thersites, who was
changing himself into a monkey. Thither, the last of all, came
Odysseus, and sought the lot of a private man, which lay neglected
and despised, and when he found it he went away rejoicing, and
said that if he had been first instead of last, his choice would have
been the same. Men, too, were seen passing into animals, and
wild and tame animals changing into one another.

When all the souls had chosen they went to Lachesis, who sent
with each of them their genius or attendant to fulfil their lot. He
first of all brought them under the hand of Clotho, and drew them
within the revolution of the spindle impelled by her hand ; from
her they were carried to Atropos, who made the threads irre-
versible; whence, without turning round, they passed beneath 621
the throne of Necessity; and when they had all passed, they
moved on in scorching heat to the plain of Forgetfulness and
rested at evening by the river Unmindful, whose water could not
be retained in any vessel ; of this they had all to drink a certain
quantity — some of them drank more than was required, and he
who drank forgot all things. Er himself was prevented from
drinking. When they had gone to rest, about the middle of the
night there were thunderstorms and earthquakes, and suddenly
they were all driven divers ways, shooting like stars to their
birth. Concerning his return to the body, he only knew that
awaking suddenly in the morning he found himself lying on the
pyre.

Thus, Glaucon, the tale has been saved, and will be our salvation,
if we believe that the soul is immortal, and hold fast to the

Why was Plato the enemy of the poets f clvii

heavenly way of Justice and Knowledge. So shall we pass Republic
undefiled over the river of Forgetfulness, and be dear to ourselves ANALySIS
and to the Gods, and have a crown of reward and happiness both
in this world and also in the millennial pilgrimage of the other.

The Tenth Book of the Republic of Plato falls into two divisions : INTRODUC-
first, resuming an old thread which has been interrupted,
Socrates assails the poets, who, now that the nature of the soul
has been analyzed, are seen to be very far gone from the truth ;
and secondly, having shown the reality of the happiness of the
just, he demands that appearance shall be restored to him, and
then proceeds to prove the immortality of the soul. The argu-
ment, as in the Phaedo and Gorgias, is supplemented by the vision
of a future life.

Why Plato, who was himself a poet, and whose dialogues are
poems and dramas, should have been hostile to the poets as a
class, and especially to the dramatic poets ; why he should not
have seen that truth may be embodied in verse as well as in
prose, and that there are some indefinable lights and shadows
of human life which can only be expressed in poetry — some
elements of imagination which always entwine with reason ; why
he should have supposed epic verse to be inseparably associated
with the impurities of the old Hellenic mythology ; why he should
try Homer and Hesiod by the unfair and prosaic test of utility, — •
are questions which have always been debated amongst students
of Plato. Though unable to give a complete answer to them, we
may show— first, that his views arose naturally out of the circum-
stances of his age ; and secondly, we may elicit the truth as well as
the error which is contained in them.

He is the enemy of the poets because poetry was declining in
his own lifetime, and a theatrocracy, as he says in the Laws
(iii. 701 A), had taken the place of an intellectual aristocracy.
Euripides exhibited the last phase of the tragic drama, and in him
Plato saw the friend and apologist of tyrants, and the Sophist
of tragedy. The old comedy was almost extinct; the new had
not yet arisen. Dramatic and lyric poetry, like every other
branch of Greek literature, was falling under the power of
rhetoric. There was no * second or third ' to ^Eschylus and

clviii Why was Plato the enemy of the poets f

Republic Sophocles in the generation which followed them. Aristophanes,
INTRODUC *n one °^ n*s ^ater comedies (Frogs, 89 foil.), speaks of ' thousands
TION. of tragedy-making prattlers,' whose attempts at poetry he com-
pares to the chirping of swallows; 'their garrulity went far
beyond Euripides,' — 'they appeared once upon the stage, and
there was an end of them.' To a man of genius who had a real
appreciation of the godlike ^Eschylus and the noble and gentle
Sophocles, though disagreeing with some parts of their ' theology '
(Rep. ii. 380), these ' minor poets ' must have been contemptible
and intolerable. There is no feeling stronger in the dialogues of
Plato than a sense of the decline and decay both in literature and
in politics which marked his own age. Nor can he have been
expected to look with favour on the licence of Aristophanes, now
at the end of his career, who had begun by satirizing Socrates
in the Clouds, and in a similar spirit forty years afterwards had
satirized the founders of ideal commonwealths in his Eccleziazusae,
or Female Parliament (cp. x. 606 C, and Laws ii. 658 ff. ; 817).

There were other reasons for the antagonism of Plato to poetry.
The profession of an actor was regarded by him as a degradation
of human nature, for 'one man in his life' cannot 'play many
parts ; ' the characters which the actor performs seem to destroy
his own character, and to leave nothing which can be truly called
himself. Neither can any man live his life and act it. The actor
is the slave of his art, not the master of it. Taking this view
Plato is more decided in his expulsion of the dramatic than of the
epic poets, though he must have known that the "Greek tragedians
afforded noble lessons and examples of virtue and patriotism, to
which nothing in Homer can be compared. But great dramatic
or even great rhetorical power is hardly consistent with firmness
or strength of mind, and dramatic talent is often incidentally
associated with a weak or dissolute character.

In the Tenth Book Plato introduces a new series of objections.
First, he says that the poet or painter is an imitator, and in
the third degree removed from the truth. His creations are
not tested by rule and measure ; they are only appearances.
In modern times we should say that art is not merely imita-
tion, but rather the expression of the ideal in forms of sense.
Even adopting the humble image of Plato, from which his
argument derives a colour, we should maintain that the artist

Why was Plato the enemy of the poets ? clix

may ennoble the bed which he paints by the folds of the drapery, Republic
or by the feeling of home which he introduces ; and there have T X'

INTRODUC-

been modern painters who have imparted such an ideal in- ™>N.
terest to a blacksmith's or a carpenter's shop. The eye or mind
which feels as well as sees can give dignity and pathos to a
ruined mill, or a straw-built shed [Rembrandt], to the hull of
a vessel * going to its last home ' [Turner]. Still more would
this apply to the greatest works of art, which seem to be the
visible embodiment of the divine. Had Plato been asked whether
the Zeus or Athene of Pheidias was the imitation of an imitation
only, would he not have been compelled to admit that something
more was to be found in them than in the form of any mortal ;
and that the rule of proportion to which they conformed was
1 higher far than any geometry or arithmetic could express ? '
(Statesman, 257 A.)

Again, Plato objects to the imitative arts that they express
the emotional rather than the rational part of human nature.
He does not admit Aristotle's theory, that tragedy or other
serious imitations are a purgation of the passions by pity and
fear ; to him they appear only to afford the opportunity of in-
dulging them. Yet we must acknowledge that we may some-
times cure disordered emotions by giving expression to them;
and that they often gain strength when pent up within our own
breast. It is not every indulgence of the feelings which is to be
condemned. For there may be a gratification of the higher as well
as of the lower — thoughts which are too deep or too sad to be
expressed by ourselves, may find an utterance in the words of
poets. Every one would acknowledge that there have been
times when they were consoled and elevated by beautiful music or
by the sublimity of architecture or by the peacefulness of nature.
Plato has himself admitted, in the earlier part of the Republic,
that the arts might have the effect of harmonizing as well as of
enervating the mind ; but in the Tenth Book he regards them
through a Stoic or Puritan medium. He asks only ' What good
have they done ? ' and is not satisfied with the reply, that ' They
have given innocent pleasure to mankind.'

He tells us that he rejoices in the banishment of the poets,
since he has found by the analysis of the soul that they are
concerned with the inferior faculties. He means to say that

clx Why was Plato the enemy of the poets ?

Republic the higher faculties have to do with universals, the lower with
, particulars of sense. The poets are on a level with their own

INTRODUC- x

TION. age, but not on a level with Socrates and Plato ; and he was
well aware that Homer and Hesiod could not be made a rule
of life by any process of legitimate interpretation ; his ironical
use of them is in fact a denial of their authority ; he saw, too,
that the poets were not critics— as he says in the Apology, ' Any
one was a better interpreter of their writings than they were
themselves ' (22 C). He himself ceased to be a poet when he
became a disciple of Socrates ; though, as he tells us of Solon,
'he might have been one of the greatest of them, if he had
not been deterred by other pursuits ' (Tim. 21 C). Thus from
many points of view there is an antagonism between Plato and
the poets, which was foreshadowed to him in the old quarrel
between philosophy and poetry. The poets, as he says in the
Protagoras (316 E), were the Sophists of their day ; and his
dislike of the one class is reflected on the other. He regards
them both as the enemies of reasoning and abstraction, though
in the case of Euripides more with reference to his immoral
sentiments about tyrants and the like. For Plato is the prophet
who 'came into the world to convince men'— first of the fallibility
of sense and opinion, and secondly of the reality of abstract ideas.
Whatever strangeness there may be in modern times in opposing
philosophy to poetry, which to us seem to have so many elements
in common, the strangeness will disappear if we conceive of
poetry as allied to sense, and of philosophy as equivalent to
thought and abstraction. Unfortunately the very word ' idea,' which
to Plato is expressive of the most real of all things, is associated
in our minds with an element of subjectiveness and unreality.
We may note also how he differs from Aristotle who declares
poetry to be truer than history, for the opposite reason, because
it is concerned with universals, not like history, with particulars
(Poet. c. 9, 3).

The things which are seen are opposed in Scripture to the
things which are unseen — they are equally opposed in Plato to
universals and ideas. To him all particulars appear to be floating
about in a world of sense; they have a taint of error or even of
evil. There is no difficulty in seeing that this is an illusion ; for
there is no more error or variation in an individual man, horse,

Why was Plato the enemy of the poets ? clxi

bed, etc., than in the class man, horse, bed, etc. ; nor is the truth Republic
which is displayed in individual instances less certain than that INTRODITC.
which is conveyed through the medium of ideas. But Plato, TION>
who is deeply impressed with the real importance of universals
as instruments of thought, attributes to them an essential truth
which is imaginary and unreal; for universals may be often
false and particulars true. Had he attained to any clear con-
ception of the individual, which is the synthesis of the universal
and the particular ; or had he been able to distinguish between
opinion -and sensation, which the ambiguity of the words 8o£a,
4>atWdat, fiKbs and the like, tended to confuse, he would not
have denied truth to the particulars of sense.

But the poets are also the representatives of falsehood and
feigning in all departments of life and knowledge, like the so-
phists and rhetoricians of the Gorgias and Phaedrus; they
are the false priests, false prophets, lying spirits, enchanters
of the world. There is another count put into the indictment
against them by Plato, that they are the friends of the tyrant,
and bask in the sunshine of his patronage. Despotism in all
ages has had an apparatus of false ideas and false teachers at
its service— in the history of Modern Europe as well as of
Greece and Rome. For no government of men depends solely
upon force; without some corruption of literature and morals
—some appeal to the imagination of the masses — some pretence
to the favour of heaven — some element of good giving power
to evil (cp. i. 352), tyranny, even for a short time, cannot be
maintained. The Greek tyrants were not insensible to the
importance of awakening in their cause a Pseudo - Hellenic
feeling; they were proud of successes at the Olympic games;
they were not devoid of the love of literature and art. Plato
is thinking in the first instance of Greek poets who had graced
the courts of Dionysius or Archelaus : and the old spirit of
freedom is roused within him at their prostitution of the Tragic
Muse in the praises of tyranny. But his prophetic eye extends
beyond them to the false teachers of other ages who are the
creatures of the government under which they live. He com-
pares the corruption of his contemporaries with the idea of a
perfect society, and gathers up into one mass of evil the evils
and errors of mankind; to him they are personified in the

m

clxii Why was Plato the enemy of the poets ?

Republic rhetoricians, sophists, poets, rulers who deceive and govern the
r x- world.

INTRODUC-
TION. A further objection which Plato makes to poetry and the

imitative arts is that they excite the emotions. Here the
modern reader will be disposed to introduce a distinction which
appears to have escaped him. For the emotions are neither
bad nor good in themselves, and are not most likely to be
controlled by the attempt to eradicate them, but by the mode-
rate indulgence of them. And the vocation of art is to present
thought in the form of feeling, to enlist the feelings on the side
of reason, to inspire even for a moment courage or resigna-
tion ; perhaps to suggest a sense of infinity and eternity in a
way which mere language is incapable of attaining. True, the
same power which in the purer age of art embodies gods and
heroes only, may be made to express the voluptuous image of
a Corinthian courtezan. But this only shows that art, like other
outward things, may be turned to good and also to evil, and
is not more closely connected with the higher than with the
lower part of the soul. All imitative art is subject to certain
limitations, and therefore necessarily partakes of the nature
of a compromise. Something of ideal truth is sacrificed for
the sake of the representation, and something in the exactness
of the representation is sacrificed to the ideal. Still, works of
art have a permanent element; they idealize and detain the
passing thought, and are the intermediates between sense and
ideas.

In the present stage of the human mind, poetry and other
forms of fiction may certainly be regarded as a good. But we
can also imagine the existence of an age in which a severer
conception of truth has either banished or transformed them.
At any rate we .must admit that they hold a different place at
different periods of the world's history. In the infancy of man-
kind, poetry, with the exception of proverbs, is the whole of
literature, and the only instrument of intellectual culture ; in
modern times she is the shadow or echo of her former self,
and appears to have a precarious existence. Milton in his day
doubted whether an epic poem was any longer possible. At
the same time we must remember, that 'what Plato would
have called the charms of poetry have been partly transferred

Why was Plato the enemy of the poets ? clxiii

to prose ; he himself (Statesman 304) admits rhetoric to be the Republic
handmaiden of Politics, and proposes to find in the strain of lNTROp.
law (Laws vii. 811) a substitute for the old poets. Among our- T10N-
selves the creative power seems often to be growing weaker,
and scientific fact to be more engrossing and overpowering to
the mind than formerly. The illusion of the feelings commonly
called love, has hitherto been the inspiring influence of modern
poetry and romance, and has exercised a humanizing if not a
strengthening influence on the world. But may not the stimulus
which love has given to fancy be some day exhausted? The
modern English novel which is the most popular of all forms
of reading is not more than a century or two old: will the
tale of love a hundred years hence, after so many thousand
variations of the same theme, be still received with unabated
interest ?

Art cannot claim to be on a level with philosophy or religion,
and may often corrupt them. It is possible to conceive a mental
state in which all artistic representations are regarded as a false
and imperfect expression, either of the religious ideal or of
the philosophical ideal. The fairest forms may be revolting in
certain moods of mind, as is proved by the fact that the Maho-
metans, and many sects of Christians, have renounced the use
of pictures and images. The beginning of a great religion,
whether Christian or Gentile, has not been 'wood or stone,'
but a spirit moving in the hearts of men. The disciples have
met in a large upper room or in ' holes and caves of the earth ' ;
in the second or third generation, they have had mosques,
temples, churches, monasteries. And the revival or reform
of religions, like the first revelation of them, has come from
within and has generally disregarded external ceremonies and
accompaniments.

But poetry and art may also be the expression of the highest
truth and the purest sentiment. Plato himself seems to waver
between two opposite views— when, as in the third Book, he in-
sists that youth should be brought up amid wholesome imagery ;
and again in Book x, when he banishes the poets from his Re-
public. Admitting that the arts, which some of us almost deify,
have fallen short of their higher aim, we must admit on the
other hand that to banish imagination wholly would be suicidal

m 2

clxiv Why was Plato the enemy of the poets ?

Republic as well as impossible. For nature too is a form of art ; and a
Breath °^ tne fresh air or a single glance at the varying land-
scape would in an instant revive and reillumine the extin-
guished spark of poetry in the human breast. In the lower
stages of civilization imagination more than reason distinguishes
man from the animals ; and to banish art would be to banish
thought, to banish language, to banish the expression of all
truth. No religion is wholly devoid of external forms; even
the Mahometan who renounces the use of pictures and images
has a temple in which he worships the Most High, as solemn
and beautiful as any Greek or Christian building. Feeling too
and thought are not really opposed ; for he who thinks must
feel before he can execute. And the highest thoughts, when
they become familiarized to us, are always tending to pass into
the form of feeling.

Plato does not seriously intend to expel poets from life and
society. But he feels strongly the unreality of their writings ; he
is protesting against the degeneracy of poetry in his own day as
we might protest against the want of serious purpose in modern
fiction, against the unseemliness or extravagance of some of our
poets or novelists, against the time-serving of preachers or public
writers, against the regardlessness of truth which to the eye of
the philosopher seems to characterize the greater part of the
world. For we too have reason to complain that our poets and
novelists 'paint inferior truth' and 'are concerned with the
inferior part of the soul'; that the readers of them become
what they read and are injuriously affected by them. And we
look in vain for that healthy atmosphere of which Plato speaks, —
* the beauty which meets the sense like a breeze and imperceptibly
draws the soul, €ven in childhood, into harmony with the beauty
of reason.'

For there might be a poetry which would be the hymn of
divine perfection, the harmony of goodness and truth among
men : a strain which should renew the youth of the world, and bring
back the ages in which the poet was man's only teacher and best
friend, — which would find materials in the living present as well
as in the romance of the past, and might subdue to the fairest
forms of speech and verse the intractable materials of modern
civilization, — which might elicit the simple principles, or, as Plato

Why was Plato the enemy of the poets f clxv

would have called them, the essential forms, of truth and justice Republic
out of the variety of opinion and the complexity of modern
society, — which would preserve all the good of each generation
and leave the bad unsung, — which should be based not on vain
longings or faint imaginings, but on a clear insight into the
nature of man. Then the tale of love might begin again in
poetry or prose, two in one, united in the pursuit of knowledge,
or the service of God and man ; and feelings of love might still
be the incentive to great thoughts and heroic deeds as in the
days of Dante or Petrarch ; and many types of manly and
womanly beauty might appear among us, rising above the or-
dinary level of humanity, and many lives which were like poems
(Laws vii. 817 B), be not only written, but lived by us. A
few such strains have been heard among men in the tragedies
of ^Eschylus and Sophocles, whom Plato quotes, not, as Homer
is quoted by him, in irony, but with deep and serious approval, —
in the poetry of Milton and Wordsworth, and in passages of
other English poets, — first and above all in the Hebrew prophets
and psalmists. Shakespeare has taught us how great men
should speak and act ; he has drawn characters of a wonderful
purity and depth ; he has ennobled the human mind, but, like
Homer (Rep. x. 599 foil.), he ' has left no way of life.' The next
greatest poet of modern times, Goethe, is concerned with 'a
lower degree of truth' ; he paints the world as a stage on which
' all the men and women are merely players ' ; he cultivates
life as an art, but he furnishes no ideals of truth and action. The
poet may rebel against any attempt to set limits to his fancy;
and he may argue truly that moralizing in verse is not poetry.
Possibly, like Mephistopheles in Faust, he may retaliate on.
his adversaries. But the philosopher will still be justified in
asking, ' How may the heavenly gift of poesy be devoted to
the good of mankind ? '

Returning to Plato, we may observe that a similar mixture
of truth and error appears in other parts of the argument. He
is aware of the absurdity of mankind framing their whole lives
according to Homer; just as in the Phaedrus he intimates the
absurdity of interpreting mythology upon rational principles;
both these were the modern tendencies of his own age, which
he deservedly ridicules. On the other hand, his argument that

clxvi The argument for immortality.

Republic Homer, if he had been able to teach mankind anything worth

INTRODUO knowing, would not have been allowed by them to go about

TION. begging as a rhapsodist, is both false and contrary to the spirit

of Plato (cp. Rep. vi. 489 A foil.). It may be compared with

those other paradoxes of the Gorgias, that * No statesman was

ever unjustly put to death by the city of which he was the

head ' ; and that ' No Sophist was ever defrauded by his pupils '

(Gorg. 519 foil.)

The argument for immortality seems to rest on the absolute
dualism of soul and body. Admitting the existence of the soul,
we know of no force which is able to put an end to her. Vice
is her own proper evil; and if she cannot be destroyed by
that, she cannot be destroyed by any other. Yet Plato has
acknowledged that the soul may be so overgrown by the in-
crustations of earth as to lose her original form; and in the
Timaeus he recognizes more strongly than in the Republic
the influence which the body has over the mind, denying even
the voluntariness of human actions, on the ground that they
proceed from physical states (Tim. 86, 87). In the Republic, as
elsewhere, he wavers between the original soul which has to
be restored, and the character which is developed by training

and education

The vision of another world is ascribed to Er, the son of Arme-
nius, who is said by Clement of Alexandria to have been
Zoroaster. The tale has certainly an oriental character, and
may be compared with the pilgrimages of the soul in the Zend
Avesta (cp. Haug, Avesta, p. 197). But no trace of acquaintance
with Zoroaster is found elsewhere in Plato's writings, and there
is no reason for giving him the name of Er the Pamphylian.
The philosophy of Heracleitus cannot be shown to be borrowed
from Zoroaster, and still less the myths of Plato.

The local arrangement of the vision is less distinct than that
of the Phaedrus and Phaedo. Astronomy is mingled with sym-
bolism and mythology ; the great sphere of heaven is represented
under the symbol of a cylinder or box, containing the seven or-
bits of the planets and the fixed stars ; this is suspended from
an axis or spindle which turns on the knees of Necessity ; the
revolutions of the seven orbits contained in the cylinder are
guided by the fates, and their harmonious motion produces

The description of the heavens. clxvii

the music of the spheres. Through the innermost or eighth Republic
.of these, which is the moon, is passed the spindle; but it is lNTROpUC
doubtful whether this is the continuation of the column of light, TION-
from which the pilgrims contemplate the heavens; the words
of Plato imply that they are connected, but not the same. The
column itself is clearly not of adamant. The spindle (which
is of adamant) is fastened to the ends of the chains which ex-
tend to the middle of the column of light — this column is said
to hold together the heaven; but whether it hangs from the
spindle, or is at right angles to it, is not explained. The cylinder
containing the orbits «of the stars is almost as much a symbol
as the figure of Necessity turning the spindle; — for the outer-
most rim is the sphere of the fixed stars, and nothing is said
about the intervals of space which divide the paths of the
stars in the heavens. The description is both a picture and
an orrery, and therefore is necessarily inconsistent with itself.
The column of light is not the Milky Way — which is neither
straight, nor like a rainbow — but the imaginary axis of the earth.
This is compared to the rainbow in respect not of form but
of colour, and not to the undergirders of a trireme, but to the
straight rope running from prow to stern in which the under-
girders meet.

The orrery or picture of the heavens given in the Republic
differs in its mode of representation from the circles of the
same and of the other in the Timaeus. In both the fixed stars
are distinguished • from the planets, and they move in orbits
without them, although in an opposite direction : in the Re-
public as in the Timaeus (40 B) they are all moving round the
axis of the world. But we are not certain that in the former
they are moving round the earth. No distinct mention is made
in the Republic of the circles of the same and other ; although
both in the Timaeus and in the Republic the motion of the
fixed stars is supposed to coincide with the motion of the whole.
The relative thickness of the rims is perhaps designed to ex-
press the relative distances of the planets.*- Plato probably
intended to represent the earth, from which Er and his com-
panions are viewing the heavens, as stationary in place ; but
whether or not herself revolving, unless this is implied in the
revolution of the axis, is uncertain (cp. Timaeus). The spectator

clxviii t The choice of the lots.

Republic may be supposed to look at the heavenly bodies, either from
INTRODUC- above or below. The earth is a sort of earth and heaven in

On6) iike tne heaven of the Phaedrus, on the back of which
the spectator goes out to take a peep at the stars and is borne
round in the revolution. There is no distinction between the
equator and the ecliptic. But Plato is no doubt led to imagine
that the planets have an opposite motion to that* of the fixed
stars, in order to account for their appearances in the heavens.
In the description of the meadow, and the retribution of the
good and evil after death, there are traces of Homer.

The description of the axis as a spindle, and of the heavenly
bodies as forming a whole, partly arises out of the attempt to
connect the motions of the heavenly bodies with the mytho-
logical image of the web, or weaving of the Fates. The giving
of the lots, the weaving of them, and the making of them irrever-
sible, which are ascribed to the three Fates— Lachesis, Clotho,
Atropos, are obviously derived from their names. The element
of chance in human life is indicated by the order of the lots.
But chance, however adverse, may be overcome by the wisdom
of man, if he knows how to choose aright; there is a worse
enemy to man than chance; this enemy is himself. He who
was moderately fortunate in the number of the lot — even the
very last comer— might have a good life if he chose with wisdom.
And as Plato does not like to make an assertion which is un-
proven, he more than confirms this statement a few sentences
afterwards by the example of Odysseus, who chose last. But
the virtue which is founded on habit is not sufficient to enable
a man to choose ; he must add to virtue knowledge, if he is to
act rightly when placed in new circumstances. The routine
of good actions and good habits is an inferior sort of goodness ;
and, as Coleridge says, 'Common sense is intolerable which is
not based on metaphysics/ so Plato would have said, 'Habit is
•worthless which is not based upon philosophy.'

The freedom of the will to refuse the evil and to choose the
good is distinctly Asserted. ' Virtue is free, and as a man honours
or dishonours her he will have more or less of her.' The life
of man is ' rounded ' by necessity ; there are circumstances prior
to birth which affect him (cp. Pol. 273 B). But within the walls of
necessity there is an open space in which he is his own master,

The credibility of the visions. clxix

and can study for himself the effects which the variously com- Republic
pounded gifts of nature or fortune have upon the soul, and act INTRODUC.
accordingly. All men cannot have the first choice in everything. TION-
But the lot of all men is good enough, if they choose wisely and
will live diligently.

The verisimilitude which is given to the pilgrimage of a
thousand years, by the intimation that Ardiaeus had lived a
thousand years before ; the coincidence of Er coming to life
on the twelfth day after he was supposed to have been dead
with the seven days which the pilgrims passed in the meadow,
and the four days during which they journeyed to the column
of light ; the precision with which the soul is mentioned who
chose the twentieth lot ; the passing remarks that there was
no definite character among the souls, and that the souls which
had chosen ill blamed any one rather than themselves ; or that
some of the souls drank more than was necessary of the waters
of Forgetfulness, while Er himself was hindered from drinking ;
the desire of Odysseus to rest at last, unlike the conception of
him in Dante and Tennyson ; the feigned ignorance of how Er
returned to the body, when the other souls went shooting like
stars to their birth, — add greatly to the probability of the narra-
tive. They are such touches of nature as the art of Defoe might
have introduced when he wished to win credibility for marvels
and apparitions.

There still remain to be considered some points which have
been intentionally reserved to the end : (I) the Janus-like
character of the Republic, which presents two faces— one an
Hellenic state, the other a kingdom of philosophers. Connected
with the latter of the two aspects are (II) the paradoxes of the
Republic, as they have been termed by Morgenstern: (a) the
community of property ; (£) of families ; (y) the rule of philo-
sophers ; (8) the analogy of the individual and the State, which,
like some other analogies in the Republic, is carried too far.
We may then proceed to consider (III) the subject of educa-
tion as conceived by Plato, bringing together in a general
view the education of youth and the education of after-life ;
(IV) we may note further some essential differences between
ancient and modern politics which are suggested by the Republic ;

clxx Spartan features of the Republic.

IKTRODUO- (V) we may compare the Politicus and the Laws ; (VI) we may
observe the influence exercised by Plato on his imitators ; and
(VII) take occasion to consider the nature and value of political,
and (VIII) of religious ideals.

I. Plato expressly says that he is intending to found an Hellenic
State (Book v. 470 E). Many of his regulations are character-
istically Spartan ; such as the prohibition of gold and silver, the
common meals of the men, the military training of the youth,
the gymnastic exercises of the women. The life of Sparta was
the life of a camp (Laws ii. 666 E), enforced even more rigidly in
time of peace than in war; the citizens of Sparta, like Plato's,
were forbidden to trade— they were to be soldiers and not shop-
keepers. Nowhere else in Greece was the individual so com-
pletely subjected to the State ; the time when he was to marry,
the education of his children, the clothes which he was to wear,
the food which he was to eat, were all prescribed by law. Some
of the best enactments in the Republic, such as the reverence
to be paid to parents and elders, and some of the worst, such
as the exposure of deformed children, are borrowed from the
practice of Sparta. The encouragement of friendships between
men and youths, or of men with one another, as affording in-
centives to bravery, is also Spartan ; in Sparta too a nearer
approach was made than in any other Greek State to equality of
the sexes, and to community of property ; and while there was
probably less of licentiousness in the sense of immorality, the
tie of marriage was regarded more lightly than in the rest of
Greece. The * suprema lex ' was the preservation of the family,
and the interest of the State. The coarse strength of a military
government was not favourable to purity and refinement; and
the excessive strictness of some regulations seems to have pro-
duced a reaction. Of all Hellenes the Spartans were most acces-
sible to bribery ; several of the greatest of them might be
. described in the words of Plato as having a ' fierce secret longing
after gold and silver.* Though not in the strict sense com-
munists, the principle of communism was maintained among
them in their division of lands, in their common meals, in their
slaves, and in the free use of one another's goods. Marriage was
a public institution : and the women were educated by the State,
and sang and danced in public with the men.

Spartan features of the Republic. clxxi

Many traditions were preserved at Sparta of the severity with INTRODUC-
which the magistrates had maintained the primitive rule of music
and poetry; as in the Republic of Plato, the new-fangled poet
was to be expelled. Hymns to the Gods, which are the only
kind of music admitted into the ideal State, were the only kind
which was permitted at Sparta. The Spartans, though an un-
poetical race, were nevertheless lovers of poetry ; they had been
stirred by the Elegiac strains of Tyrtaeus, they had crowded
around Hippias to hear his recitals of Homer ; but in this they
resembled the citizens of the timocratic rather than of the ideal
State (548 E). The council of elder men also corresponds to the
Spartan gerousia ; and the freedom with which they are per-
mitted to judge about matters of detail agrees with what we are
told of that institution. Once more, the military rule of not
spoiling the dead or offering arms at the temples ; the modera-
tion in the pursuit of enemies ; the importance attached to the
physical well-being of the citizens ; the use of warfare for the
sake of defence rather than of aggression— are features probably
suggested by the spirit and practice of Sparta.

To the Spartan type the ideal State reverts in the first decline ;
and the character of the individual timocrat is borrowed from the
Spartan citizen. The love of Lacedaemon not only affected
Plato and Xenophon, but was shared by many undistinguished
Athenians ; there they seemed to find a principle which was
wanting in their own democracy. The cuKorr/u'a of the Spartans at-
tracted them, that is to say, not the goodness of their laws, but
the spirit of order and loyalty which prevailed. Fascinated by the
idea, citizens of Athens would imitate the Lacedaemonians in their
dress and manners ; they were known to the contemporaries ^
of Plato as 'the persons who had their ears bruised,' like the
Roundheads of the Commonwealth. The love of another church
or country when seen at a distance only, the longing for an
imaginary simplicity in civilized times, the fond desire of a past
which never has been, or of a future which never will be, — these
are aspirations of the human mind which are often felt among
ourselves. Such feelings meet with a response in the Republic
of Plato.

But there are other features of the Platonic Republic, as, for
example, the literary and philosophical education, and the grace

clxxii Hellenic feeling in Plato.

INTRODUC- and beauty of life, which are the reverse of Spartan. Plato
wishes to give his citizens a taste of Athenian freedom as well
as of Lacedaemonian discipline. His individual genius is purely
Athenian, although in theory he is a lover of Sparta; and he
is something more than either — he has also a true Hellenic
feeling. He is desirous of humanizing the wars of Hellenes
against one another; he acknowledges that the Delphian God
is the grand hereditary interpreter of all Hellas. The spirit of
harmony and the Dorian mode are to prevail, and the whole
State is to have an external beauty which is the reflex of the
harmony within. But he has not yet found out the truth which
he afterwards enunciated in the Laws (i. 628 D)— that he was a
better legislator who made men to be of one mind, than he who
trained them for war. The citizens, as in other Hellenic States,
democratic as well as aristocratic, are really an upper class;
for, although no mention is made of slaves, the lower classes
are allowed to fade away into the distance, and are represented
in the individual by the passions. Plato has no idea either of
a social State in which all classes are harmonized, or of a federa-
tion of Hellas or the world in which different nations or States
have a place. His city is equipped for war rather than for peace,
and this would seem to be justified by the ordinary condition of
Hellenic States. The myth of the earth-born men is an embodi-
ment of the orthodox tradition of Hellas, and the allusion to the
four ages of the world is also sanctioned by the authority of
Hesiod and the poets. Thus we see that the Republic is partly
founded on the ideal of the old Greek polis, partly on the actual
circumstances of Hellas in that age. Plato, like the old painters,
j retains the traditional form, and like them he has also a vision of
a city in the clouds.

There is yet another thread which is interwoven in the texture
of the work ; for the Republic is not only a Dorian State, but a
Pythagorean league. The ' way of life ' which was connected with
the name of Pythagoras, like the Catholic monastic orders, showed
the power which the mind of an individual might exercise over
his contemporaries, and may have naturally suggested to Plato the
possibility of reviving such ' mediaeval institutions.' The Pytha-
goreans, like Plato, enforced a rule of life and a moral and in-
tellectual training. The influence ascribed to music, which to

The Pythagorean way of life. clxxiii

us seems exaggerated, is also a Pythagorean feature ; it is not to INTRODUC-
be regarded as representing the real influence of music in the
Greek world. More nearly than any other government of
Hellas, the Pythagorean league of three hundred was an aris-
tocracy of virtue. For once in the history of mankind the philo-
sophy of order or Kovpos, expressing and consequently enlisting
on its side the combined endeavours of the better part of the
people, obtained the management of public affairs and held
possession of it for a considerable time (until about B. c. 500).
Probably only in States prepared by Dorian institutions would
such a league have been possible. The rulers, like Plato's ^uXa/cey,
were required to submit to a severe training in order to prepare
the way for the education of the other members of the com-
munity. Long after the dissolution of the Order, eminent Pytha-
goreans, such as Archytas of Tarentum, retained their political
influence over the cities of Magna Graecia. There was much here
that was suggestive to the kindred spirit of Plato, who had
doubtless meditated deeply on the ' way of life of Pythagoras '
(Rep. x. 600 B) and his followers. Slight traces of Pythagorean-
ism are to be found in the mystical number of the State, in the
number which expresses the interval between the king and the
tyrant, in the doctrine of transmigration, in the music of the
spheres, as well as in the great though secondary importance
ascribed to mathematics in education.

But as in his philosophy, so also in the form of his State, he
goes far beyond the old Pythagoreans. He attempts a task really
impossible, which is to unite the past of Greek history with the
future of philosophy, analogous to that other impossibility, which
has often been the dream of Christendom, the attempt to unite
the past history of Europe with the kingdom of Christ. Nothing
actually existing in the world at all resembles Plato's ideal State ;
nor does he himself imagine that such a State is possible. This
he repeats again and again ; e. g. in the Republic (ix. sub fin.), or
in the Laws (Book v. 739), where, casting a glance back on the
Republic, he admits that the perfect state of communism and
philosophy was impossible in his own age, though still to be
retained as a pattern. The same doubt is implied in the earnest-
ness with which he argues in the Republic (v. 472 D) that ideals
are none the worse because they cannot be realized in fact, and

clxxiv

Was Plato a good citizen '?

- in the chorus of laughter, which like a breaking wave will, as
he anticipates, greet the mention of his proposals ; though
like other writers of fiction, he uses all his art to give reality to
his inventions. When asked how the ideal polity can come into
being, he answers ironically, ' When one son of a king becomes
a philosopher ' ; he designates the fiction of the earth-born men
as ' a noble lie ' ; and when the structure is finally complete, he
fairly tells you that his Republic is a vision only, which in some
sense may have reality, but not in the vulgar one of a reign of
philosophers upon earth. It has been said that Plato flies as
well as walks, but this falls short of the truth ; for he flies and
walks at the same time, and is in the air and on firm ground in
successive instants.

Niebuhr has asked a trifling question, which may be briefly
noticed in this place— Was Plato a good citizen ? If by this is
meant, Was he loyal to Athenian institutions ?— he can hardly be
said to be the friend of democracy : but neither is he the friend
of any other existing form of government ; all of them he re-
garded as ' states of faction ' (Laws viii. 832 C) ; none attained to
his ideal of a voluntary rule over voluntary subjects, which seems
indeed more nearly to describe democracy than any other ; and
the worst of them is tyranny. The truth is, that the question has
hardly any meaning when applied to a great philosopher whose
writings are not meant for a particular age and country, but for
all time and all mankind. The decline of Athenian politics was
probably the motive which led Plato to frame an ideal State, and
the Republic may be regarded as reflecting the departing glory
of Hellas. As well might we complain of St. Augustine, whose
great work ' The City of God ' originated in a similar motive, for
not being loyal to the Roman Empire. Even a nearer parallel
might be afforded by the first Christians, who cannot fairly
be charged with being bad citizens because, though 'subject to
the higher powers,' they were looking forward to a city which is
in heaven.

II. The idea of the perfect State is full of paradox when
judged of according to the ordinary notions of mankind. The
paradoxes of one age have been said' to become the common-
places of the next ; but the paradoxes of Plato are at least as
paradoxical to us as they were to his contemporaries. The

The community of property. clxxv

modern world has either sneered at them as absurd, or de-
nounced them as unnatural and immoral ; men have been pleased
to find in Aristotle's criticisms of them the anticipation of their
own good sense. The wealthy and cultivated classes have dis-
liked and also dreaded them ; they have pointed with satisfaction
to the failure of efforts to realize them in practice. Yet since
they are the thoughts of one of the greatest of human intelli-
gences, and of one who has done most to elevate morality and
religion, they seem to deserve a better treatment at our hands.
We may have to address the public, as Plato does poetry, and
assure them that we mean no harm to existing institutions.
There are serious errors which have a side of truth and which
therefore may fairly demand a careful consideration : there are
truths mixed with error of which we may indeed say, * The half is
better than the whole.' Yet 'the half may be an important con-
tribution to the study of human nature.

(a) The first paradox is the community of goods, which is
mentioned slightly at the end of the third Book, and seemingly,
as Aristotle observes, is confined to the guardians ; at least no
mention is made of the other classes. But the omission is not
of any real significance, and probably arises out of the plan of
the work, which prevents the writer from entering into details.

Aristotle censures the community of property much in the
spirit of modern political economy, as tending to repress in-
dustry, and as doing away with the spirit of benevolence.
Modern writers almost refuse to consider the subject, which is
supposed to have been long ago settled by the common, opinion
of mankind. But it must be remembered that the sacredness of
property is a notion far more fixed in modern than in ancient
times. The world has grown older, and is therefore more con-
servative. Primitive society offered many examples of land held
in common, either by a tribe or by a township, and such may
probably have been the original form of landed tenure. Ancient
legislators had invented various modes of dividing and preserving
the divisions of land among the citizens ; according to Aristotle
there were nations who held the land in common and divided
the produce, and there were others who divided the land and
stored the produce in common. The evils of debt and the in-
equality of property were far greater in ancient than in modern

clxxvi The community of property.

INTRODUC- times, and the accidents to which property was subject from war,

TION. t t ...

or revolution, or taxation, or other legislative interference, were
also greater. All these circumstances gave property a less fixed
and sacred character. The early Christians are believed to have
held their property in common, and the principle is sanctioned
by the words of Christ himself, and has been maintained as a
counsel of perfection in almost all ages of the Church. Nor have
there been wanting instances of modern enthusiasts who have
made a religion of communism ; in every age of religious excite-
ment notions like Wycliffe's ' inheritance of grace ' have tended
to prevail. A like spirit, but fiercer and more violent, has ap-
peared in politics. ' The preparation of the Gospel of peace ' soon
becomes the red flag of Republicanism.

We can hardly judge what effect Plato's views would have
upon his own contemporaries ; they would perhaps have seemed
to them only an exaggeration of the Spartan commonwealth.
Even modern writers would acknowledge that the right of private
property is based on expediency, and may be interfered with in
a variety of ways for the public good. Any other mode of vesting
property which was found to be more advantageous, would in
time acquire the same basis of right ; ' the most useful,' in Plato's
words, 'would be the most sacred.' The lawyers and ecclesi-
astics of former ages would have spoken of property as a sacred
institution. But they only meant by such language to oppose the
greatest amount of resistance to any invasion of the rights of in-
dividuals and of the Church.

When we consider the question, without any fear of immediate
application to practice, in the spirit of Plato's Republic, are we
quite sure that the received notions of property are the best?
Is the distribution of wealth which is customary in civilized
countries the most favourable that can be conceived for the
education and development of the mass of mankind ? Can * the
spectator of all time and all existence* be quite convinced that
one or two thousand years hence, great changes will not have
taken place in the rights of property, or even that the very notion
of property, beyond what is necessary for personal maintenance,
may not have disappeared ? This was a distinction familiar to
Aristotle, though likely to be laughed at among ourselves. Such
a change would not be greater than some other changes through

The community of property. clxxvii

which the world has passed in the transition from ancient to
modern society, for example, the emancipation of the serfs in
Russia, or the abolition of slavery in America and the West
Indies ; and not so great as the difference which separates the
Eastern village community from the Western world. To accom-
plish such a revolution in the course of a few centuries, would
imply a rate of progress not more rapid than has actually taken
place during the last fifty or sixty years. The kingdom of Japan
underwent more change in five or six years than Europe in five
or six hundred. Many opinions and beliefs which have been
cherished among ourselves quite as strongly as the sacredness of
property have passed away ; and the most untenable propositions
respecting the right of bequests or entail have been maintained
with as much fervour as the most moderate. Some one will be
heard to ask whether a state of society can be final in which the
interests of thousands are perilled on the life or character of a
single person. And many will indulge the hope that our present
condition may, after all, be only transitional, and may conduct to
a higher, in which property, besides ministering to the enjoyment
of the few, may also furnish the means of the highest culture to
all, and will be a greater benefit to the public generally, and also
more under the control of public authority. There may come a
time when the saying, ' Have I not a right to do what I will with
my own ? ' will appear to be a barbarous relic of individualism ; —
when the possession of a part may be a greater blessing to each
and all than the possession of the whole is now to any one.

Such reflections appear visionary to the eye of the practical
statesman, but they are within the range of possibility to the
philosopher. He can imagine that in some distant age or clime,
and through the influence of some individual, the notion of com-
mon property may or might have sunk as deep into the heart of
a race, and have become as fixed to them, as private property
is to ourselves. He knows that this latter institution is not more
than four or five thousand years old : may not the end revert to
the beginning? In our own age even Utopias affect the spirit of
legislation, and an abstract idea may exercise a great influence on
practical politics.

The objections that would be generally urged against Plato's
community of property, are the old ones of Aristotle, that motives

n

clxxviii The community of property,

INTRODUC- for exertion would be taken away, and that disputes would arise
when each was dependent upon all. Every man would produce
as little and consume as much as he liked. The experience of
civilized nations has hitherto been adverse to Socialism. The
effort is too great for human nature ; men try to live in common,
but the personal feeling is always breaking in. On the other
hand it may be doubted whether our present notions of property
are not conventional, for they differ in different countries and
in different states of society. We boast of an individualism
which is not freedom, but rather an artificial result of the in-
dustrial state of modern Europe. The individual is nominally
free, but he is also powerless in a world bound hand and foot
in the chains of economic necessity. Even if we cannot expect
the mass of mankind to become disinterested, at any rate we
observe in them a power of organization which fifty years ago
would never have been suspected. The same forces which have
revolutionized the political system of Europe, may effect a similar
change in the social and industrial relations of mankind. And
if we suppose the influence of some good as well as neutral
motives working in the community, there will be no absurdity
in expecting that the mass of mankind having power, and
becoming enlightened about the higher possibilities of human
life, when they learn how much more is attainable for all than
is at present the possession of a favoured few, may pursue the
common interest with an intelligence and persistency which man-
kind have hitherto never seen.

Now that the world has once been set in motion, and is no
longer held fast under the tyranny of custom and ignorance ; now
that criticism has pierced the veil of tradition and the past no
longer overpowers the present, — the progress of civilization may
be expected to be far greater and swifter than heretofore. Even
at our present rate of speed the point at which we may arrive
in two or three generations is beyond the power of imagination
to foresee. There are forces in the world which work, not in an
arithmetical, but in a geometrical ratio of increase. Education, to
use the expression of Plato, moves like a wheel with an ever-
multiplying rapidity. Nor can we say how great may be its
influence, when it becomes universal, — when it has been in-
herited by many generations,— when it is freed from the trammels

The community of wives and children. clxxix

of superstition and rightly adapted to the wants and capacities
of different classes of men and women. Neither do we know
how much more the co-operation of minds or of hands may be
capable of accomplishing, whether in labour or in study. The
resources of the natural sciences are not half-developed as yet ;
the soil of the earth, instead of growing more barren, may become
many times more fertile than hitherto ; the uses of machinery
far greater, and also more minute than at present. New secrets
of physiology may be revealed, deeply affecting human nature
in its innermost recesses. The standard of health may be raised
and the lives of men prolonged by sanitary and medical know-
ledge. There may be peace, there may be leisure, there may
be innocent refreshments of many kinds. The ever-increasing
power of locomotion may join the extremes of earth. There
may be mysterious workings of the human mind, such as occur
only at great crises of history. The East and the West may meet
together, and all nations may contribute their thoughts and their
experience to the common stock of humanity. Many other ele-
ments enter into a speculation of this kind. But it is better to
make an end of them. For such reflections appear to the
majority far-fetched, and to men of science, commonplace.

(j3) Neither to the mind of Plato nor of Aristotle did the doctrine
of community of property present at all the same difficulty, or
appear to be the same violation of the common Hellenic senti-
ment, as the community of wives and children. This paradox
he prefaces by another proposal, that the occupations of men and
women shall be the same, and that to this end they shall have
a common training and education. Male and female animals have
the same pursuits — why not also the two sexes of man ?

But have we not here fallen into a contradiction ? for we were
saying that different natures should have different pursuits. How
then can men and women have the same ? And is not the pro-*
posal inconsistent with our notion of the division of labour ? —
These objections are no sooner raised than answered; for, ac-
cording to Plato, there is no organic difference between men and
women, but only the accidental one that men beget and women
bear children. Following the analogy of the other animals, he
contends that all natural gifts are scattered about indifferently
among both sexes, though there may be a superiority of degree

n 2

clxxx The community of wives and children.

INTRODUC- on the part of the men. The objection on the score of decency
to their taking part in the same gymnastic exercises, is met by
Plato's assertion that the existing feeling is a matter of habit.

That Plato should have emancipated himself from the ideas of
his own country and from, the example of the East, shows a
wonderful independence of mind. He is conscious that women
are half the human race, in some respects the more important half
(Laws vi. 781 B) ; and for the sake both of men and women he
desires to raise the woman to a higher level of existence. He
brings, not sentiment, but philosophy to bear upon a question
which both in ancient and modern times has been chiefly re-
garded in the light of custom or feeling. The Greeks had noble
conceptions of womanhood in the goddesses Athene and Artemis,
and in the heroines Antigone and Andromache. But these ideals
had no counterpart in actual life. The Athenian woman was in no
way the equal of her husband ; she was not the entertainer of his
guests or the mistress of his house, but only his housekeeper and
the mother of his children. She took no part in military or politi-
cal matters ; nor is there any instance in the later ages of Greece
of a woman becoming famous in literature. ' Hers is the greatest
glory who has the least renown among men,' is the historian's
conception of feminine excellence. A very different ideal of
womanhood is held up by Plato to the world ; she is to be the
companion of the man, and to share with him in the toils of war
and in the cares of government. She is to be similarly trained
both in bodily and mental exercises. She is to lose as far as
possible the incidents of maternity and the characteristics of the
female sex.

The modern antagonist of the equality of the sexes would argue
that the differences between men and women are not confined to
the single point urged by Plato ; that sensibility, gentleness, grace,
are the qualities of women, while energy, strength, higher intelli-
gence, are to be looked for in men. And the criticism is just :
the differences affect the whole nature, and are not, as Plato
supposes, confined to a single point. But neither can we say how
far these differences are due to education and the opinions of
mankind, or physically inherited from the habits and opinions of
former generations. Women have been always taught, not
exactly that they are slaves, but that they are in an inferior

The community of wives and children. clxxxi

position, which is also supposed to have compensating advantages ;
and to this position they have conformed. It is also true that the
physical form may easily change in the course of generations
through the mode of life ; and the weakness or delicacy, which
was once a matter of opinion, may become a physical fact. The
characteristics of sex vary greatly in different countries arid ranks
of society, and at different ages in the same individuals. Plato
may have been right in denying that there was any ultimate
difference in the sexes of man other than that which exists in
animals, because all other differences may be conceived to dis-
appear in other states of society, or under different circumstances
of life and training.

The first wave having been passed, we proceed to the second —
community of wives and children. ' Is it possible ? Is it desir-
able ? ' For, as Glaucon intimates, and as we far more strongly
insist, ' Great doubts may be entertained about both these points.'
Any free discussion of the question is impossible, and mankind
are perhaps right in not allowing the ultimate bases of social life
to be examined. Few of us can safely enquire into the things
which nature hides, any more than we can dissect our own bodies.
Still, the manner in which Plato arrived at his conclusions should
be considered. For here, as Mr. Grote has remarked, is a
wonderful thing, that one of the wisest and best of men should
have entertained ideas of morality which are wholly at variance
with our own. And if we would do Plato justice, we must
examine carefully the character of his proposals. First, we may
observe that the relations of the sexes supposed by him are the
reverse of licentious : he seems rather to aim at an impossible
strictness. Secondly, he conceives the family to be the natural
enemy of the state ; and he entertains the serious hope that an
universal brotherhood may take the place of private interests—
an aspiration which, although not justified by experience, has
possessed many noble minds. On the other hand, there is no
sentiment or imagination in the connections which men and
women are supposed by him to form ; human beings return to
the level of the animals, neither exalting to heaven, nor yet
abusing the natural instincts. All that world of poetry and fancy
which the passion of love has called forth in modern literature
and romance would have been banished by Plato. The arrange-

clxxxii The community of wives and children.

IHTRQDUC- ments of marriage in the Republic are directed to one object—
the improvement of the race. In successive generations a great
development both of bodily and mental qualities might be pos-
sible. The analogy of animals tends to show that mankind can.
within certain limits receive a change of nature. And as in
animals we should commonly choose the best for breeding, and
destroy the others, so there must be a selection made of the
human beings whose lives are worthy to be preserved.

. We start back horrified from this Platonic ideal, in the belief,
first, that the higher feelings of humanity are far too strong to be
crushed out ; secondly, that if the plan could be carried into
execution we should be poorly recompensed by improvements in
the breed for the loss of the best things in life. The greatest
regard for the weakest and meanest of human beings— the infant,
the criminal, the insane, the idiot, truly seems to us one of the
noblest results of Christianity. We have learned, though as yet
imperfectly, that the individual man has an endless value in the
sight of God, and that we honour Him when we honour the
darkened and disfigured image of Him (cp. Laws xi. 931 A). This
is the lesson which Christ taught in a parable when He said,
' Their angels do always behold the face of My Father which is
in heaven.' Such lessons are only partially realized in any age ;
they were foreign to the age of Plato, as they have very different
degrees of strength in different countries or ages of the Christian
world. To the Greek the family was a religious and customary
institution binding the members together by a tie inferior in
strength to that of friendship, and having a less solemn and
sacred sound than that of country. The relationship which
existed on the lower level of custom, Plato imagined that he was
raising to the higher level of nature and reason ; while from the
modern and Christian point of view we regard him as sanctioning
murder and destroying the first principles of morality.

The great error in these and similar speculations is that the
difference between man and the animals is forgotten in them. The
human being is regarded with the eye of a dog- or bird-fancier
(v. 459 A), or at best of a slave-owner ; the higher or human
qualities are left out. The breeder of animals aims chiefly at size
or speed or strength ; in a few cases at courage or temper ; most
often the fitness of the animal for food is the great desideratum.

The community of wives and children. clxxxiii

But mankind are not bred to be eaten, nor yet for their superiority INTRODUC-
TION.
in fighting or in running or in drawing carts. Neither does the

improvement of the human race consist merely in the increase of
the bones and flesh, but in the growth and enlightenment of the
mind. Hence there must be ' a marriage of true minds ' as well as
of bodies, of imagination and reason as well as of lusts and instincts.
Men and women without feeling or imagination are justly called
brutes ; yet Plato takes away these qualities and puts nothing in
their place, not even the desire of a noble offspring, since parents
are not to know their own children. The most important transac-
tion of social life, he who is the idealist philosopher converts into
the most brutal. For the pair are to have no relation to one
another, except at the hymeneal festival ; their children are not
theirs, but the state's ; nor is any tie of affection to unite them.
Yet here the analogy of the animals might have saved Plato from
a gigantic error, if he had ' not lost sight of his own illustration '
(ii. 375 D). For the ' nobler sort of birds and beasts ' (v. 459 A)
nourish and protect their offspring and are faithful to one another.

An eminent physiologist thinks it worth while ' to try and place
life on a physical basis.' But should not life rest on the moral
rather than upon the physical? The higher comes first, then
the lower ; first the human and rational, afterwards the animal.
Yet they are not absolutely divided ; and in times of sickness or
moments of self-indulgence they seem to be only different aspects
of a common human nature which includes them both. Neither is
the moral the limit of the physical, but the expansion and enlarge-
ment of it, — the highest form which the physical is capable of
receiving. As Plato would say, the body does not take care of the
body, and still less of the mind, but the mind takes care of both.
In all human action not that which is common to man and the
animals is the characteristic element, but that which distinguishes
him from them. Even if we admit the physical basis, and resolve
all virtue into health of body — ' lafagon que notre sang circule,' still
on merely physical grounds we must come back to ideas. Mind
and reason and duty and conscience, under these or other names,
are always reappearing. There cannot be health of body without
health of mind ; nor health of mind without the sense of duty and
the love of truth (cp. Charm. 156 D, E).

That the greatest of ancient philosophers should in his regulations

clxxxiv The community of wives and children.

INTRODUC- about marriage have fallen into the error of separating body and
mind, does indeed appear surprising. Yet the wonder is not
so much that Plato should have entertained ideas of morality
which to our own age are revolting, but that he should have con-
tradicted himself to an extent which is hardly credible, falling
in an instant from the heaven of idealism into the crudest
animalism. Rejoicing in the newly found gift of reflection, he
appears to have thought out a subject about which he had
better have followed the enlightened feeling of his own age. The
general sentiment of Hellas was opposed to his monstrous fancy.
The old poets, and in later time the tragedians, showed no want of
respect for the family, on which much of their religion was based.
But the example of Sparta, and perhaps in some degree the
tendency to defy public opinion, seems to have misled him. He
will make one family out of all the families of the state. He will
select the finest specimens of men and women and breed from
these only.

Yet because the illusion is always returning (for the animal part
of human nature will from time to time assert itself in the disguise
of philosophy as well as of poetry), and also because any departure
from established morality, even where this is not intended, is apt
to be unsettling, it may be worth while to draw out a little more
at length the objections to the Platonic marriage. In the first
place, history shows that wherever polygamy has been largely
allowed the race has deteriorated. One man to one woman is the
law of God and nature. Nearly all the civilized peoples of the
world at some period before the age of written records, have
become monogamists ; and the step when once taken has never
been retraced. The exceptions occurring among Brahmins or
Mahometans or the ancient Persians, are of that sort which may be
said to prove the rule. The connexions formed between superior
and inferior races hardly ever produce a noble offspring, because
they are licentious; and because the children in such cases
usually despise the mother and are neglected by the father who
is ashamed of them. Barbarous nations when they are introduced
by Europeans to vice die out ; polygamist peoples either import
and adopt children from other countries, or dwindle in numbers,
or both. Dynasties and aristocracies which have disregarded the
laws of nature have decreased in numbers and degenerated in

The community of wives and children. clxxxv

stature ; ' manages de convenance ' leave their enfeebling stamp
on the offspring of them (cp. King Lear, Act i. Sc. 2). The
marriage of near relations, or the marrying in and in of the same
family tends constantly to weakness or idiocy in the children,
sometimes assuming the form as they grow older of passionate
licentiousness. The common prostitute rarely has any offspring.
By such unmistakable evidence is the authority of morality
asserted in the relations of the sexes : and so many more elements
enter into this ' mystery ' than are dreamed of by Plato and some
other philosophers.

Recent enquirers have indeed arrived at the conclusion that
among primitive tribes there existed a community of wives as
of property, and that the captive taken by the spear was the
only wife or slave whom any man was permitted to call his own.
The partial existence of such customs among some of the lower
races of man, and the survival of peculiar ceremonies in the
marriages of some civilized nations, are thought to furnish a
proof of similar institutions having been once universal. There
can be no question that the study .of anthropology has consider-
ably changed our views respecting the first appearance of man
upon the earth. We know more about the aborigines of the
world than formerly, but our increasing knowledge shows above
all things how little we know. With all the helps which written
monuments afford, we do but faintly realize the condition of man
two thousand or three thousand years ago. Of what his condition
was when removed to a distance 200,000 or 300,000 years, when
the majority of mankind were lower and nearer the animals than
any tribe now existing upon the earth, we cannot even entertain
conjecture. Plato (Laws iii. 676 foil.) and Aristotle (Metaph. xi. 8,
§§ 19,20) may have been more right than we imagine in supposing
that some forms of civilization were discovered and lost several
times over. If we cannot argue that all barbarism is a degraded
civilization, neither can we set any limits to the depth of degrada-
tion to which the human race may sink through war, disease, or
isolation. And if we are to draw inferences about the origin
of marriage from the practice of barbarous nations, we should
also consider the remoter analogy of the animals. Many birds
and animals, especially the carnivorous, have only one mate, and
the love and care of offspring which seems to be natural is in-

clxxxvi The community of wives and children.

INTRODUC- consistent with the primitive theory of marriage. If we go back
to an imaginary state in which men were almost animals and
the companions of them, we have as much right to argue from
what is animal to what is human as from the barbarous to the
civilized man. The record of animal life on the globe is frag-
mentary,— the connecting links are wanting and cannot be sup-
plied; the record of social life is still more fragmentary and
precarious. Even if we admit that our first ancestors had no
such institution as marriage, still the stages by which men passed
from outer barbarism to the comparative civilization of China,
Assyria, and Greece, or even of the ancient Germans, are wholly
unknown to us.

Such speculations are apt to be unsettling, because they seem
to show that an institution which was thought to be a revelation
from heaven, is only the growth of history and experience. We
ask what is the origin of marriage, and we are told that like
the right of property, after many wars and contests, it has
gradually arisen out of the selfishness of barbarians. We stand
face to face with human nature in its primitive nakedness. We
are compelled to accept, not the highest, but the lowest account
of the origin of human society. But on the other hand we may
truly say that every step in human progress has been in the
same direction, and that in the course of ages the idea of marriage
and of the family has been more and more defined and conse-
crated. The civilized East is immeasurably in advance of any
savage tribes ; the Greeks and Romans have improved upon the
East; the Christian nations have been stricter in their views
of the marriage relation than any of the ancients. In this as
in so many other things, instead of looking back with regret to
the past, we should look forward with hope to the future. We
must consecrate that which we believe to be the most holy, and
that ' which is the most holy will be the most useful.' There is
more reason for maintaining the sacredness of the marriage tie,
when we see the benefit of it, than when we only felt a vague
religious horror about the violation of it. But in all times of
transition, when established beliefs are being undermined, there
is a danger that in the passage from the old to the new we may
insensibly let go the moral principle, finding an excuse for listen-
ing to the voice of passion in the uncertainty of knowledge, or the

The community of wives and children. clxxxvii

fluctuations of opinion. And there are many persons in our own INTRODUC-
day who, enlightened by the study of anthropology, and fascinated
by what is new and strange, some using the language of fear,
others of hope, are inclined to believe that a time will come when
through the self-assertion of women, or the rebellious spirit of
children, by the analysis of human relations, or by the force of
outward circumstances, the ties of family life may be broken or
greatly relaxed. They point to societies in America and else-
where which tend to show that the destruction of the family need
not necessarily involve the overthrow of all morality. Whatever
we may think of such speculations, we can hardly deny that they
have been more rife in this generation than in any other; and
whither they are tending, who can predict ?

To the doubts and queries raised by these 'social reformers'
respecting the relation of the sexes and the moral nature of man,
there is a sufficient answer, if any is needed. The difference be-
tween them and us is really one of fact. They are speaking of man
as they wish or fancy him to be, but we are speaking of him as he
is. They isolate the animal part of his nature ; we regard him as a
creature having many sides, or aspects, moving between good and
evil, striving to rise above himself and to become * a little lower
than the angels.' We also, to use a Platonic formula, are not
ignorant of the dissatisfactions and incompatibilities of family life,
of the meannesses of trade, of the flatteries of one class of society
by another, of the impediments which the family throws in the way
of lofty aims and aspirations. But we are conscious that there are
evils and dangers in the background greater still, which are not
appreciated, because they are either concealed or suppressed.
What a condition of man would that be, in which human passions
were controlled by no authority, divine or human, in which there
was no shame or decency, no higher affection overcoming or
^sanctifying the natural instincts, but simply a rule of health ! Is it
for this that we are asked to throw away the civilization which is
the growth of ages ?

For strength and health are not the only qualities to be desired ;
there are the more important considerations of mind and character
and soul. We know how human nature may be degraded ; we
do not know how by artificial means any improvement in the
breed can be effected. The problem is a complex onej for if we

clxxxviii The community of wives and children.

INTRODUC- go back only four steps (and these at least enter into the com-
position of a child), there are commonly thirty progenitors to
be taken into account. Many curious facts, rarely admitting of
proof, are told us respecting the inheritance of disease or character
from a remote ancestor. We can trace the physical resemblances
of parents and children in the same family —

' Sic oculos, sic ille manus, sic ora ferebat ' ;

but scarcely less often the differences which distinguish children
both from their parents and from one another. We are told
of similar mental peculiarities running in families, and again
of a tendency, as in the animals, to revert to a common or
original stock. But we have a difficulty in distinguishing what
is a true inheritance of genius or other qualities, and what is
mere imitation or the result of similar circumstances. Great
men and great women have rarely had great fathers and mothers.
Nothing that we know of in the circumstances of their birth or
lineage will explain their appearance. Of the English poets of
the last and two preceding centuries scarcely a descendant
remains, — none have ever been distinguished. So deeply has
nature hidden her secret, and so ridiculous is the fancy which
has been entertained by some that we might in time by suitable
marriage arrangements or, as Plato would have said, 'by an
ingenious system of lots/ produce a Shakespeare or a Milton.
Even supposing that we could breed men having the tenacity
of bulldogs, or, like the Spartans, ' lacking the wit to run away
in battle,' would the world be any the better? Many of the
noblest specimens of the human race have been among the
weakest physically. Tyrtaeus or Aesop, or our own Newton,
would have been exposed at Sparta; and some of the fairest
and strongest men and women have been among the wickedest
and worst. Not by the Platonic device of uniting the strong
and fair with the strong and fair, regardless of sentiment anda
morality, nor yet by his other device of combining dissimilar
natures (Statesman 310 A), have mankind gradually passed from
the brutality and licentiousness of primitive marriage to marriage
Christian and civilized.

Few persons would deny that we bring into the world an
inheritance of mental and physical qualities derived first from
our parents, or through them from some remoter ancestor,

The community of wives and children. clxxxix

secondly from our race, thirdly from the general condition of INTRODUC-
mankind into which we are born. Nothing is commoner than
the remark, that ' So and so is like his father or his uncle ' ;
and an aged person may not unfrequently note a resemblance
in a youth to a long-forgotten ancestor, observing that 'Nature
sometimes skips a generation.' It may be true also, that if we
knew more about our ancestors, these similarities would be even
more striking to us. Admitting the facts which are thus described
in a popular way, we may however remark that there is no
method of difference by which they can be defined or estimated,
and that they constitute only a small part of each individual. The
doctrine of heredity may seem to take out of our hands the conduct
of our own lives, but it is the idea, not the fact, which is really
terrible to us. For what we have received from our ancestors is
only a fraction of what we are, or may become. The knowledge
that drunkenness or insanity has been prevalent in a family may
be the best safeguard against their recurrence in a future genera-
tion. The parent will be most awake to the vices or diseases
in his child of which he is most sensible within himself. The
whole of life may be directed to their prevention or cure. The
traces of consumption may become fainter, or be wholly effaced :
the inherent tendency to vice or crime may be eradicated. And
so heredity, from being a curse, may become a blessing. We
acknowledge that in the matter of our birth, as in our nature
generally, there are previous circumstances which affect us. But
upon this platform of circumstances or within this wall of neces-
sity, we have still the power of creating a life for ourselves by the
informing energy of the human will.

There is another aspect of the marriage question to which Plato
is a stranger. All the children born in his state are foundlings.
It never occurred to him that the greater part of them, according
to universal experience, would have perished. For children can
only be brought up in families. There is a subtle sympathy
between the mother and the child which cannot be supplied by
other mothers, or by ' strong nurses one or more ' (Laws vii. 789 E).
If Plato's 'pen' was as fatal as the Creches of Paris, or the
foundling hospital of Dublin, more than nine-tenths of his children
would have perished. There would have been no need to expose
or put out of the way the weaklier children, for they would have

cxc The community of wives and children.

INTRODUC- died of themselves. So emphatically does nature protest against
the destruction of the family.

What Plato had heard or seen of Sparta was applied by him
in a mistaken way to his ideal commonwealth. He probably
observed that both the Spartan men and women were superior
in form and strength to the other Greeks ; and this superiority
he was disposed to attribute to the laws and customs relating
to marriage. He did not consider that the desire of a noble
offspring was a passion among the Spartans, or that their
physical superiority was to be attributed chiefly, not to their
marriage customs, but to their temperance and training. He
did not reflect that Sparta was great, not in consequence of the
relaxation of morality, but in spite of it, by virtue of a political
principle stronger far than existed in any other Grecian state.
Least of all did he observe that Sparta did not really produce
the finest specimens of the Greek race. The genius, the political
inspiration of Athens, the love of liberty — all that has made
Greece famous with posterity, were wanting among the Spartans.
They had no Themistocles, or Pericles, or Aeschylus, or Sopho-
cles, or Socrates, or Plato. The individual was not allowed
to appear above the state ; the laws were fixed, and he had no
business to alter or reform them. Yet whence has the progress
of cities and nations arisen, if not from remarkable individuals,
coming into the world we know not how, and from causes over
which we have no control? Something too much may have
been said in modern times of the value of individuality. But
we can hardly condemn too strongly a system which, instead of
fostering the scattered seeds or sparks of genius and character,
tends to smother and extinguish them.

Still, while condemning Plato, we must acknowledge that
neither Christianity, nor any other form of religion and society,
has hitherto been able to cope with this most difficult of social
problems, and that the side from which Plato regarded it is that
from which we turn away. Population is the most untameable
force in the political and social world. Do we not find, especi-
ally in large cities, that the greatest hindrance to the amelioration
of the poor is their improvidence in marriage? — a small fault
truly, if not involving endless consequences. There are whole
countries too, such as India, or, nearer home, Ireland, in which a

The community of wives and children. cxci

right solution of the marriage question seems to lie at the founda- INTRODUC-
tion of the happiness of the community. There are too many
people on a given space, or they marry too early and bring
into the world a sickly and half-developed offspring; or owing
to the very conditions of their existence, they become emaciated
and hand on a similar life to their descendants. But who can
oppose the voice of prudence to the ' mightiest passions of man-
kind ' (Laws viii. 835 C), especially when they have been licensed
by custom and religion ? In addition to the influences of educa-
tion, we seem to require some new principles of right and wrong
in these matters, some force of opinion, which may indeed be
already heard whispering in private, but has never affected the
moral sentiments of mankind in general. We unavoidably lose
sight of the principle of utility, just in that action of our lives
in which we have the most need of it. The influences which
we can bring to bear upon this question are chiefly indirect.
In a generation or two, education, emigration, improvements in
agriculture and manufactures, may have provided the solution.
The state physician hardly likes to probe the wound : it is beyond
his art ; a matter which he cannot safely let alone, but which he
dare not touch :

' We do but skin and film the ulcerous place.'

When again in private life we see a whole family one by one
dropping into the grave under the Ate of some inherited malady,
and the parents perhaps surviving them, do our minds ever
go back silently to that day twenty-five or thirty years before
on which under the fairest auspices, amid the rejoicings of
friends and acquaintances, a bride and bridegroom joined hands
with one another ? In making such a reflection we are not
opposing physical considerations to moral, but moral to physical ;
we are seeking to make the voice of reason heard, which drives
us back from the extravagance of sentimentalism on common
sense. The late Dr. Combe is said by his biographer to have
resisted the temptation to marriage, because he knew that he
was subject to hereditary consumption. One who deserved to
be called a man of genius, a friend of my youth, was in the habit
of wearing a black ribbon on his wrist, in order to remind him
that, being liable to outbreaks of insanity, he must not give way
to the natural impulses of affection : he died unmarried in a

cxcii The community of wives and children.

INTRODUC- lunatic asylum. These two little facts suggest the reflection that a

TION.

very few persons have done from a sense of duty what the rest of
mankind ought to have done under like circumstances, if they had
allowed themselves to think of all the misery which they were
about to bring into the world. If we could prevent such mar-
riages without any violation of feeling or propriety, we clearly
ought ; and the prohibition in the course of time would be pro-
tected by a ' horror naturalis ' similar to that which, in all civilized
ages and countries, has prevented the marriage of near relations
by blood. Mankind would have been the happier, if some things
which are now allowed had from the beginning been denied to
them ; if the sanction of religion could have prohibited practices
inimical to health ; if sanitary principles could in early ages have
been invested with a superstitious awe. But, living as we do far
on in the world's history, we are no longer able to stamp at once
with the impress of religion a new prohibition. A free agent can-
not have his fancies regulated by law ; and the execution of the
law would be rendered impossible, owing to the uncertainty of
the cases in which marriage was to be forbidden. Who can
weigh virtue, or even fortune against health, or moral and mental
qualities against bodily ? Who can measure probabilities against
certainties? There has been some good as well as evil in the
discipline of suffering; and there are diseases, such as con-
sumption, which have exercised a refining and softening in-
fluence on the character. Youth is too inexperienced to balance
such nice considerations ; parents do not often think of them, or
think of them too late. They are at a distance and may probably
be averted ; change of place, a new state of life, the interests of
a home may be the cure of them. So persons vainly reason when
their minds are already made up and their fortunes irrevocably
linked together. Nor is there any ground for supposing that
marriages are to any great extent influenced by reflections of
this sort, which seem unable to make any head against the
irresistible impulse of individual attachment.

Lastly, no one can have observed the first rising flood of the
passions in youth, the difficulty of regulating them, and the
effects on the whole mind and nature which follow from them,
the stimulus which is given to them by the imagination, without
feeling that there is something unsatisfactory in our method of

The community of women and children. cxciii

treating them. That the most important influence on human life Republic.
should be wholly left to chance or shrouded in mystery, and
instead of being disciplined or understood, should be required to
conform only to an external standard of propriety — cannot be
regarded by the philosopher as a safe or satisfactory condition of
human things. And still those who have the charge of youth may
find a way by watchfulness, by affection, by the manliness and
innocence of their own lives, by occasional hints, by general admo-
nitions which every one can apply for himself, to mitigate this
terrible evil which eats out the heart of individuals and corrupts
the moral sentiments of nations. In no duty towards others is
there more need of reticence and self-restraint. So great is the
danger lest he who would be the counsellor of another should
reveal the secret prematurely, lest he should get another too much
into his power, or fix the passing impression of evil by demanding
the confession of it.

Nor is Plato wrong in asserting that family attachments may
interfere with higher aims. If there have been some who 'to
party gave up what was meant for mankind/ there have cer-
tainly been others who to family gave up what was meant for
mankind or for their country. The cares of children, the
necessity of procuring money for their support, the flatteries
of the rich by the poor, the exclusiveness of caste, the pride
of birth or wealth, the tendency of family life* to divert men
from the pursuit of the ideal or the heroic, are as lowering in
our own age as in that of Plato. And if we prefer to look at
the gentle influences of home, the development of the affections,
the amenities of society, the devotion of one member of a family
for the good of the others, which form one side of the picture,
we must not quarrel with him, or perhaps ought rather to be
grateful to him, for having presented to us the reverse. Without
attempting to defend Plato on grounds of morality, we may allow
that there is an aspect of the world which has not unnaturally
led him into error.

We hardly appreciate the power which the idea of the State,
like all other abstract ideas, exercised over the mind of Plato.
To us the State seems to be built up out of the family, or some-
times to be the framework in which family and social life is
contained. But to Plato in his present mood of mind the family

o

cxciv The government of philosophers.

Republic, is only a disturbing influence which, instead of filling up, tends
to disarrange tne higher unity of the State. No organization
is needed except a political, which, regarded from another point
of view, is a military one. The State is all-sufficing for the wants
of man, and, like the idea of the Church in later ages, absorbs all
other desires and aifections. In time of war the thousand citizens
are to stand like a rampart impregnable against the world or the
Persian host ; in time of peace the preparation for war and their
duties to the State, which are also their duties to one another,
take up their whole life and time. The only other interest which
is allowed to them besides that of war, is the interest of philo-
sophy. When they are too old to be soldiers they are to retire
from active life and to have a second novitiate of study and
contemplation. There is an element of monasticism even in
Plato's communism. If he could have done without children,
he might have converted his Republic into a religious order.
Neither in the Laws (v. 739 B), when the daylight of common
sense breaks in upon him, does he retract his error. In the
state of which he would be the founder, there is no marrying
or giving in marriage : but because of the infirmity of mankind,
he condescends to allow the law of nature to prevail.

(y) But Plato has an equal, or, in his own estimation, even
greater paradox in reserve, which is summed up in the famous
text, 'Until kings are philosophers or philosophers are kings,
cities will never cease from ill.' And by philosophers he explains
himself to mean those who are capable of apprehending ideas,
especially the idea of good. To the attainment of this higher
knowledge the second education is directed. Through a process
of training which has already made them good citizens they
are now to be made good legislators. We find with some sur-
prise (not unlike the feeling which Aristotle in a well-known
passage describes the hearers of Plato's lectures as experiencing,
when they went to a discourse on the idea of good, expecting
to be instructed in moral truths, and received instead of them
arithmetical and mathematical formulae) that Plato does not
propose for his future legislators any study of finance or law
or military tactics, but only of abstract mathematics, as a pre-
paration for the still more abstract conception of good. We ask,
with Aristotle, What is the use of a man knowing the idea of

The government of philosophers. cxcv

good, if he does not know what is good for this individual, Republic.
this state, this condition of society ? We cannot understand
how Plato's legislators or guardians are to be fitted for their
work of statesmen by the study of the five mathematical sciences.
We vainly search in Plato's own writings for any explanation
of this seeming absurdity.

The discovery of a great metaphysical conception seems to
ravish the mind with a prophetic consciousness which takes
away the power of estimating its value. No metaphysical en-
quirer has ever fairly criticised his own speculations; in his
own judgment they have been above criticism; nor has he
understood that what to him seemed to be absolute truth may
reappear in the next generation as a form of logic or an in-
strument of thought. And posterity have also sometimes equally
misapprehended the real value of his speculations. They appear
to them to have contributed nothing to the stock of human
knowledge. The idea of good is apt to be regarded by the
modern thinker as an unmeaning abstraction ; but he forgets
that this abstraction is waiting ready for use, and will hereafter
be filled up by the divisions of knowledge. When mankind do
not as yet know that the world is subject to law, the introduc-
tion of the mere conception of law or design or final cause, and
the far-off anticipation of the harmony of knowledge, are great
steps onward. Even the crude generalization of the unity of
all things leads men to view the world with different eyes, and
may easily affect their conception of human life and of politics,
and also their own conduct and character (Tim. 90 A).1 We can
imagine how a great mind like that of Pericles might derive
elevation from his intercourse with Anaxagoras (Phaedr. 270 A).
To be struggling towards a higher but unattainable conception
is a more favourable intellectual condition than to rest satisfied
in a narrow portion of ascertained fact. And the earlier, which
have sometimes been the greater ideas of science, are often
lost sight of at a later period. How rarely can we say of any
modern enquirer in the magnificent language of Plato, that
* He is the spectator of all time and of all existence ! '

Nor is there anything unnatural in the hasty application of
these vast metaphysical conceptions to practical and political
life. In the first enthusiasm of ideas men are apt to see them

02

cxcvi The government of philosophers.

Republic, everywhere, and to apply them in the most remote sphere.

INTRODUC- They do not understand that the experience of ages is required
to enable them to fill up ' the intermediate axioms.' Plato him-
self seems to have imagined that the truths of psychology, like
those of astronomy and harmonics, would be arrived at by a
process of deduction, and that the method which he has pur-
sued in the Fourth Book, of inferring them from experience
and the use of language, was imperfect and only provisional.
But when, after having arrived at the idea of good, which is the
end of the science of dialectic, he is asked, What is the nature, and
what are the divisions of the science ? he refuses to answer, as
if intending by the refusal to intimate that the state of knowledge
which then existed was not such as would allow the philo-
sopher to enter into his final rest. The previous sciences must
first be studied, and will, we may add, continue to be studied
till the end of time, although in a sense different from any
^vhich Plato could have conceived. But we may observe,
that while he is aware of the vacancy of his own ideal, he is
full of enthusiasm in the contemplation of it. Looking into the
orb of light, he sees nothing, but he is warmed and elevated.
The Hebrew prophet believed that faith in God would enable
him to govern the world ; the Greek philosopher imagined
that contemplation of the good would make a legislator. There
is as much to be filled up in the one case as in the other, and
the one mode of conception is to the Israelite what the other
is to the Greek. Both find a repose in a divine perfection,
which, whether in a more personal or impersonal form, exists
without them and independently of them, as well as within
them.

There is no mention of the idea of good in the Timaeus, nor
of the divine Creator of the world in the Republic ; and we are
naturally led to ask in what relation they stand to one another.
Is God above or below the idea of good ? Or is the Idea of
Good another mode of conceiving God ? The latter appears to be
the truer answer. To the Greek philosopher the perfection
and unity of God was a far higher conception than his person-
ality, which he hardly found a word to express, and which to
him would have seemed to be borrowed from mythology. To
the Christian, on the other hand, or to the modern thinker in

The government of philosophers. cxcvii

general, it is difficult, if not impossible, to attach reality td Republic.
what he terms mere abstraction ; while to Plato this very ab- INTTRJ^UC"
straction is the truest and most real of all things. Hence, from
a difference in forms of thought, Plato appears to be resting
on a creation of his own mind only. But if we may be allowed
to paraphrase the idea of good by the words 'intelligent prin-
ciple of law and order in the universe, embracing equally man
and nature/ we begin to find a meeting-point between him and
ourselves.

The question whether the ruler or statesman should be a
philosopher is one that has not lost interest in modern times.
In most countries of Europe and Asia there has been some one
in the course of ages who has truly united the power of com-
mand with the power of thought and reflection, as there have
been also many false combinations of these qualities. Some
kind of speculative power is necessary both in practical and
political life ; like the rhetorician in the Phaedrus, men require
to have a conception of the varieties of human character, and
to be raised on great occasions above the commonplaces of
ordinary life. Yet the idea of the philosopher-statesman has
never been popular with the mass of mankind ; partly because
he cannot take the world into his confidence or make them
understand the motives from which he acts; and also because
they are jealous of a power which they do not understand.
The revolution which human nature desires to effect step by
step in many ages is likely to be precipitated by him in a single
year or life. They are afraid that in the pursuit of his greater
aims he may disregard the common feelings of humanity. He
is too apt to be looking into the distant future or back into the
remote past, and unable to see actions or events which, to use
an expression of Plato's, ' are tumbling out at his feet.' Besides,
as Plato would say, there are other corruptions of these philo-
sophical statesmen. Either 'the native hue of resolution is
sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,' and at the moment
when action above all things is required he is undecided, or
general principles are enunciated by him in order to cover
some change of policy ; or his ignorance of the world has
made him more easily fall a prey to the arts of others ; or in
some cases he has been converted into a courtier, who enjoys

cxcviii The government of philosophers.

Republic, the luxury of holding liberal opinions, but was never known to
Perf°rm a liberal action. No wonder that mankind have been in
the habit of calling statesmen of this class pedants, sophisters,
doctrinaires, visionaries. For, as we may be allowed to say, a
little parodying the words of Plato, ' they have seen bad imitations
of the philosopher-statesman.' But a man in whom the power
of thought and action are perfectly balanced, equal to the pre-
sent, reaching forward to the future, 'such a one/ ruling in a
constitutional state, ' they have never seen.'

But as the philosopher is apt to fail in the routine of political
life, so the ordinary statesman is also apt to fail in extraordinary
crises. When the face of the world is beginning to alter, and
thunder is heard in the distance, he is still guided by his old
maxims, and is the slave of his inveterate party prejudices ; he
cannot perceive the signs of the times; instead of looking for-
ward he looks back ; he learns nothing and forgets nothing ;
with ' wise saws and modern instances ' he would stem the
rising tide of revolution. He lives more and more within the
circle of his own party, as the world without him becomes
stronger. This seems to be the reason why the old order of
things makes so poor a figure when confronted with the new,
why churches can never reform, why most political changes
are made blindly and convulsively. The great crises in the
history of nations have often been met by an ecclesiastical
positiveness, and a more obstinate reassertion of principles
which have lost their hold upon a nation. The fixed ideas of
a reactionary statesman may be compared to madness ; they grow
upon him, and he becomes possessed by them ; no judgement of
others is ever admitted by him to be weighed in the balance
against his own.

(5) Plato, labouring under what, to modern readers, appears
to have been a confusion of ideas, assimilates the state to the
individual, and fails to distinguish Ethics from Politics. He
thinks that to be most of a state which is most like one
man, and in which the citizens have the greatest uniformity of
character. He does not see that the analogy is partly fal-
lacious, and that the will or character of a state or nation is
really the balance or rather the surplus of individual wills,
which are limited by the condition of having to act in common.

The State and the Individual. cxcix

The movement of a body of men can never have the pliancy Republic.
or facility of a single man ; the freedom of the individual, which INTRODUC-

J TION.

is always limited, becomes still more straitened when transferred
to a nation. The powers of action and feeling are necessarily
weaker and more balanced when they are diffused through
a community ; whence arises the often discussed question, ' Can
a nation, like an individual, have a conscience?' We hesitate
to say that the characters of nations are nothing more than
the sum of the characters of the individuals who compose
them ; because there may be tendencies in individuals which
react upon one another. A whole nation may be wiser than any
one man in it ; or may be animated by some common opinion
or feeling which could not equally have affected the mind of a
single person, or may have been inspired by a leader of genius to
perform acts more than human. Plato does not appear to have
analysed the complications which arise out of the collective
action of mankind. Neither is he capable of seeing that analo-
gies, though epecious as arguments, may often have no founda-
tion in fact, or of distinguishing between what is intelligible
or vividly present to the mind, and what is true. In this respect
he is far below Aristotle, who is comparatively seldom imposed
upon by false analogies. He cannot disentangle the arts from
the virtues — at least he is always arguing from one to the
other. His notion of music is transferred from harmony of
sounds to harmony of life: in this he is assisted by the am-
biguities of language as well as by the prevalence of Pythagorean
notions. And having once assimilated the state to the individual,
he imagines that he will find the succession of states paralleled
in the lives of individuals.

Still, through this fallacious medium, a real enlargement of
ideas is attained. When the virtues as yet presented no distinct
conception to the mind, a great advance was made by the com-
parison of them with the arts ; for virtue is partly art, and has
an outward form as well as an inward principle. The harmony
of music affords a lively image of the harmonies of the world and
of human life, and may be regarded as a splendid illustration
which was naturally mistaken for a real analogy. In the same
way the identification of ethics with politics has a tendency to
give definiteness to ethics, and also to elevate and ennoble men's

cc The Education of the Republic.

Republic, notions of the aims of government and of the duties of citizens ;

IN TION U° *°r ethics fr°m one point of view may be conceived as an idealized
law and politics ; and politics, as ethics reduced to the conditions
of human society. There have been evils which have arisen
out of the attempt to identify them, and this has led to the
separation or antagonism of them, which has been introduced
by modern political writers. But we may likewise feel that
something has been lost in their separation, and that the
ancient philosophers who estimated the moral and intellectual
wellbeing of mankind first, and the wealth of nations and indi-
viduals second, may have a salutary influence on the speculations
of modern times. Many political maxims originate in a reaction
against an opposite error; and when the errors against which
they were directed have passed away, they in turn become
errors.

III. Plato's views of education are in several respects re-
markable; like the rest of the Republic they are partly Greek
and partly ideal, beginning with the ordinary curriculum of the
Greek youth, and extending to after-life. Plato is the first writer
who distinctly says that education is to comprehend the whole
of life, and to be a preparation for another in which education
begins again (vi. 4980). This is the continuous thread which
runs through the Republic, and which more than any other of
his ideas admits of an application to modern life.

He has long given up the notion that virtue cannot be taught ;
and he is disposed to modify the thesis of the Protagoras, that
the virtues are one and not many. He is not unwilling to
admit the sensible world into his scheme of truth. Nor does
he assert in the Republic the involuntariness of vice, which
is maintained by him in the Timaeus, Sophist, and Laws
(cp. Protag. 345 foil., 352, 355; Apol. 25 E; Gorg. 468, 509 E).
Nor do the so-called Platonic ideas recovered from a former
state of existence affect his theory of mental improvement. Still
we observe in him the remains of the old Socratic doctrine, that
true knowledge must be elicited from within, and is to be sought
for in ideas, not in particulars of sense. Education, as he says,
will implant a principle of intelligence which is better than ten

The Education of the Republic. cci

thousand eyes. The paradox that the virtues are one, and the Republic.
kindred notion that all virtue is knowledge, are not entirely re-
nounced ; the first is seen in the supremacy given to justice over
the rest ; the second in the tendency to absorb the moral virtues
in the intellectual, and to centre all goodness in the contemplation
of the idea of good. The world of sense is still depreciated and
identified with opinion, though admitted to be a shadow of the
true. In the Republic he is evidently impressed with the con-
viction that vice arises chiefly from ignorance and may be cured
by education ; the multitude are hardly to be deemed responsible
for what they do (v. 499 E). A faint allusion to the doctrine of
reminiscence occurs in the Tenth Book (621 A) ; but Plato's views
of education have no more real connection with a previous state
of existence than our own ; he only proposes to elicit from the
mind that which is there already. Education is represented by
him, not as the filling of a vessel, but as the turning the eye of
the soul towards the light.

He treats first of music or literature, which he divides into true
and false, and then goes on to gymnastics; of infancy in the
Republic he takes no notice, though in the Laws he gives sage
counsels about the nursing of children and the management of
the mothers, and would have an education which is even prior to
birth. But in the Republic he begins with the age at which the
child is capable of receiving ideas, and boldly asserts, in language
which sounds paradoxical to modern ears, that he must be taught
the false before he can learn the true. The modern and ancient
philosophical world are not agreed about truth and falsehood ; the
one identifies truth almost exclusively with fact, the other with
ideas. This is the difference between ourselves and Plato, which
is, however, partly a difference of words (cp. supra, p. xxxviii). For
we too should admit that a child must receive many lessons which
he imperfectly understands ; he must be taught some things in a
figure only, some too which he can hardly be expected to believe
when he grows older ; but we should limit the use of fiction by the
necessity of the case. Plato would draw the line differently \
according to him the aim of early education is not truth as a matter
of fact, but truth as a matter of principle ; the child is to be taught
first simple religious truths, and then simple moral truths, and
insensibly to learn the lesson of good manners and good taste. He

ccii The Education of the Republic.

Republic, would make an entire reformation of the old mythology; like
" Xenophanes and Heracleitus he is sensible of the deep chasm
which separates his own age from Homer and Hesiod, whom he
quotes and invests with an imaginary authority, but only for his
own purposes. The lusts and treacheries of the gods are to be
banished ; the terrors of the world below are to be dispelled ; the
misbehaviour of the Homeric heroes is not to be a model for
youth. But there is another strain heard in Homer which may
teach our youth endurance; and something may be learnt in
medicine from the simple practice of the Homeric age. The
principles on which religion is to be based are two only : first, that
God is true ; secondly, that he is good. Modern and Christian
writers have often fallen short of these ; they can hardly be said
to have gone beyond them.

The young are to be brought up in happy surroundings, out of
the way of sights or sounds which may hurt the character or
vitiate the taste. They are to live in an atmosphere of health ; the
breeze is always to be wafting to them the impressions of truth
and goodness. Could such an education be realized, or if our
modern religious education could be bound up with truth and
virtue and good manners and good taste, that would be the best
hope of human improvement. Plato, like ourselves, is looking
forward to changes in the moral and religious world, and is pre-
paring for them. He recognizes the danger of unsettling young
men's minds by sudden changes of laws and principles, by destroy-
ing the sacredness of one set of ideas when there is nothing else to
take their place. He is afraid too of the influence of the drama,
on the ground that it encourages false sentiment, and therefore he
would not have his children taken to the theatre ; he thinks that
the effect on the spectators is bad, and on the actors still worse.
His idea of education is that of harmonious growth, in which are
insensibly learnt the lessons of temperance and endurance, and
the body and mind develope in equal proportions. The first prin-
ciple which runs through all art and nature is simplicity; this
also is to be the rule of human life.

The second stage of education is gymnastic, which answers to
the period of muscular growth and development. The simplicity
which is enforced in music is extended to gymnastic ; Plato is
aware that the training of the body may be inconsistent with the

The Education of the Repiiblic. cciii

training of the mind, and that bodily exercise may be easily over- Republic.
done. Excessive training of the body is apt to give men a headache
or to render them sleepy at a lecture on philosophy, and this they
attribute not to the true cause, but to the nature of the subject.
Two points are noticeable in Plato's treatment of gymnastic :—
First, that the time of training is entirely separated from the time
of literary education. He seems to have thought that two things
of an opposite and different nature could not be learnt at the same
time. Here we can hardly agree with him ; and, if we may judge by
experience, the effect of spending three years between the ages of
fourteen and seventeen in mere bodily exercise would be far from
improving to the intellect. Secondly, he affirms that music and
gymnastic are not, as common opinion is apt to imagine, intended,
the one for the cultivation of the mind and the other of the body,
but that they are both equally designed for the improvement of the
mind. The body, in his view, is the servant of the mind ; the
subjection of the lower to the higher is for the advantage of both.
And doubtless the mind may exercise a very great and paramount
influence over the body, if exerted not at particular moments and
by fits and starts, but continuously, in making preparation for the
whole of life. Other Greek writers saw the mischievous tendency
of Spartan discipline (Arist. Pol. viii. 4, § i foil. ; Thuc. ii. 37, 39).
But only Plato recognized the fundamental error on which the
practice was based.

The subject of gymnastic leads Plato to the sister subject of
medicine, which he further illustrates by the parallel of law.
The modern disbelief in medicine has led in this, as in some other
departments of knowledge, to a demand for greater simplicity ;
physicians are becoming aware that they often make diseases
* greater and more complicated ' by their treatment of them
(Rep. iv. 426 A). In two thousand years their art has made but
slender progress ; what they have gained in the analysis of the
parts is in a great degree lost by their feebler conception of the
human frame as a whole. They have attended more to the cure
of diseases than to the conditions of health ; and the improvements
in medicine have been more than counterbalanced by the disuse
of regular training. Until lately they have hardly thought of air
and water, the importance of which was well understood by the
ancients ; as Aristotle remarks, 'Air and water, being the elements

cciv The Education of the Republic,

Republic, which we most use, have the greatest effect upon health ' (Polit.
vii- IT> § 4)- For aSes physicians have been under the dominion of
prejudices which have only recently given way ; and now there
are as many opinions in medicine as in theology, and an equal
degree of scepticism and some want of toleration about both. Plato
has several good notions about medicine ; according to him, 'the
eye cannot be cured without the rest of the body, nor the body
without the mind ' (Charm. 156 E). No man of sense, he says in
the Timaeus, would take physic ; and we heartily sympathize with
him in the Laws when he declares that ' the limbs of the rustic
worn with toil will derive more benefit from warm baths than from
the prescriptions of a not over wise doctor ' (vi. 761 C). But we
can hardly praise him when, in obedience to the authority of
Homer, he depreciates diet, or approve of the inhuman spirit in
which he would get rid of invalid and useless lives by leaving
them to die. He does not seem to have considered that the ' bridle
of Theages ' might be accompanied by qualities which were of far
more value to the State than the health or strength of the citizens ;
or that the duty of taking care of the helpless might be an important
element of education in a State. The physician himself (this is
a delicate and subtle observation) should not be a man in robust
health ; he should have, in modern phraseology, a nervous tem-
perament ; he should have experience of disease in his own person,
in order that his powers of observation may be quickened in the
case of others.

The perplexity of medicine is paralleled by the perplexity of
law ; in which, again, Plato would have men follow the golden rule
of simplicity. Greater matters are to be determined by the
legislator or by the oracle of Delphi, lesser matters are to be left
to the temporary regulation of the citizens themselves. Plato is
aware that laissez faire is an important element of government.
The diseases of a State are like the heads of a hydra; they
multiply when they are cut off. The true remedy for them is not
extirpation but prevention. And the way to prevent them is to
take care of education, and education will take care of all the rest.
So in modern times men have often felt that the only political
measure worth having— the only one which would produce any
certain or lasting effect, was a measure of national education. And
in our own more than in any previous age the necessity has been

The Education of the Republic. ccv

recognized of restoring the ever-increasing confusion of law to Republic.
simplicity and common sense. INTRODUC-

When the training in music and gymnastic is completed, there
follows the first stage of active and public life. But soon education
is to begin again from a new point of view. In the interval
between the Fourth and Seventh Books we have discussed the
nature of knowledge, and have thence been led to form a higher
conception of what was required of us. For true knowledge,
according to Plato, is of abstractions, and has to do, not with
particulars or individuals, but with universals only ; not with the
beauties of poetry, but with the ideas of philosophy. And the
great aim of education is the cultivation of the habit of abstraction.
This is to be acquired through the study of the mathematical
sciences. They alone are capable of giving ideas of relation, and
of arousing the dormant energies of thought.

Mathematics in the age of Plato comprehended a very small part
of that which is now included in them ; but they bore a much
larger proportion to the sum of human knowledge. They were
the only organon of thought which the human mind at that time
possessed, and the only measure by which the chaos of particulars
could be reduced to rule and order. The faculty which they
trained was naturally at war with the poetical or imaginative ; and
hence to Plato, who is everywhere seeking for abstractions and
trying to get rid of the illusions of sense, nearly the whole of edu-
cation is contained in them. They seemed to have an inexhaustible
application, partly because their true limits were not yet under-
stood. These Plato himself is beginning to investigate ; though
not aware that number and figure are mere abstractions of sense,
he recognizes that the forms used by geometry are borrowed
from the sensible world (vi. 510, 511). He seeks to find the
ultimate ground of mathematical ideas in the idea of good, though
he does not satisfactorily explain the connexion between them;
and in his conception of the relation of ideas to numbers, he falls
very far short of the definiteness attributed to him by Aristotle
(Met. i. 8, § 24 ; ix. 17). But if he fails to recognize the true limits
of mathematics, he also reaches a point beyond them ; in his view,
ideas of number become secondary to a higher conception of
knowledge. The dialectician is as much above the mathematician
as the mathematician is above the ordinary man (cp. vii. 526 D,

ccvi The Idea of Good.

Republic. 531 E). The one, the self-proving, the good which is the higher
sphere of dialectic, is the perfect truth to which all things ascend,
and in which they finally repose.

This self-proving unity or idea of good is a mere vision of
which no distinct explanation can be given, relative only to a
particular stage in Greek philosophy. It is an abstraction under
which no individuals are comprehended, a whole which has
no parts (cf. Arist, Nic. Eth., i. 4). The vacancy of such a form
was perceived by Aristotle, but not by Plato. Nor did he recognize
that in the dialectical process are included two or more methods
of investigation which are at variance with each other. He did
not see that whether he took the longer or the shorter road, no
advance could be made in this way. And yet such visions often
have an immense effect ; for although the method of science
cannot anticipate science, the idea of science, not as it is, but
as it will be in the future, is a great and inspiring principle. In
the pursuit of knowledge we are always pressing forward to
something beyond us ; and as a false conception of knowledge,
for example the scholastic philosophy, may lead men astray during
many ages, so the true ideal, though vacant, may draw all
their thoughts in a right direction. It makes a great difference
whether the general expectation of knowledge, as this indefinite
feeling may be termed, is based upon a sound judgment. For
mankind may often entertain a true conception of what knowledge
ought to be when they have but a slender experience of facts.
The correlation of the sciences, the consciousness of the unity
of nature, the idea of classification, the sense of proportion,
the unwillingness to stop short of certainty or to confound pro-
bability with truth, are important principles of the higher edu-
cation. Although Plato could tell us nothing, and perhaps knew
that he could tell us nothing, of the absolute truth, he has exercised
an influence on the human mind which even at the present day
is not exhausted ; and political and social questions may yet arise
in which the thoughts of Plato may be read anew and receive
a fresh meaning.

The Idea of good is so called only in the Republic, but there
are traces of it in other dialogues of Plato. It is a cause as
well as an idea, and from this point of view may be compared
with the creator of the Timaeus, who out of his goodness created

The Science of Dialectic. ccvii

all things. It corresponds to a certain extent with the modern Republic.

conception of a law of nature, or of a final cause, or of both in INTRODUC-
TION.
one, and in this regard may be connected with the measure

and symmetry of the Philebus. It is represented in the Sym-
posium under the aspect of beauty, and is supposed to be attained
there by stages of initiation, as here by regular gradations of
knowledge. Viewed subjectively, it is the process or science
of dialectic. This is the science which, according to the Phae-
drus, is the true basis of rhetoric, which alone is able to distin-
guish the natures and classes of men and things ; which divides
a whole into the natural parts, and reunites the scattered parts,
into a natural or organized whole ; which defines the abstract
essences or universal ideas of all things, and connects them;
which pierces the veil of hypotheses and reaches the final cause
or first principle of all; wjhich regards the sciences in relation
to the idea of good. This ideal science is the highest process
of thought, and may be described as the soul conversing with
herself or holding communion with eternal truth and beauty,
and in another form is the everlasting question and answer —
the ceaseless interrogative of Socrates. The dialogues of Plato
are themselves examples of the nature and method of dialectic. .

Viewed objectively, the idea of good is a power or cause which
makes the world without us correspond with the world within.
Yet this world without us is still a world of ideas. With Plato
the investigation of nature is another department of knowledge,
and in this he seeks to attain only probable conclusions (cp.
Timaeus, 44 D).

If we ask whether this science of dialectic which Plato only
half explains to us is more akin to logic or to metaphysics, the
answer is that in his mind the two sciences are not as yet dis-
tinguished, any more than the subjective and objective aspects
of the world and of man, which German philosophy has revealed
to us. Nor has he determined whether his science of dialectic
is at rest or in motion, concerned with the contemplation of
absolute being, or with a process of development and evolu-
tion. Modern metaphysics may be described as the science of
abstractions, or as the science of the evolution of thought ; modern
logic, when passing beyond the bounds of mere Aristotelian
forms, may be defined as the science of method. The germ of

ccviii The Science of Dialectic.

Republic, both of them is contained in the Platonic dialectic ; all meta-
" Pnysicians nave something in common with the ideas of Plato ;
all logicians have derived something from the method of Plato.
The nearest approach in modern philosophy to the universal
science of Plato, is to be found in the Hegelian ' succession of
moments in the unity of the idea/ Plato and Hegel alike seem
to have conceived the world as the correlation of abstractions ;
and not impossibly they would have understood one another
better than any of their commentators understand them (cp. Swift's
Voyage to Laputa, c. 8 T). There is, however, a diiference between
.them : for whereas Hegel is thinking of all the minds of men
as one mind, which developes the stages of the idea in different
countries or at different times in the same country, with Plato
these gradations are regarded only as an order of thought or
ideas ; the history of the human mind had not yet dawned
upon him.

Many criticisms may be made on Plato's theory of education.
While in some respects he unavoidably falls short of modern
thinkers, in others he is in advance of them. He is opposed to
the modes of education which prevailed in his own time; but
he can hardly be said to have discovered new ones. He does

1 ' Having a desire to see those ancients who were most renowned for wit

* and learning, I set apart one day on purpose. I proposed that Homer and
' Aristotle might appear at the head of all their commentators ; but these were
'so numerous that some hundreds were forced to attend in the court and
'outward rooms of the palace. I knew, and could distinguish these two

* heroes, at first sight, not only from the crowd, but from each other. Homer
' was the taller and comelier person of the two, walked very erect for one of
' his age, and his eyes were the most quick and piercing I ever beheld. Aris-
' totle stooped much, and made use of a staff. His visage was meagre, his
' hair lank and thin, and his voice hollow. I soon discovered that both of
' them were perfect strangers to the rest of the company, and had never seen or
4 heard of them before. And I had a whisper from a ghost, who shall be
4 nameless, " That these commentators always kept in the most distant quarters
' from their principals, in the lower world, through a consciousness of shame
' and guilt, because they had so horribly misrepresented the meaning of these
' authors to posterity." I introduced Didymus and Eustathius to Homer, and
' prevailed on him to treat them better than perhaps they deserved, for he soon
' found they wanted a genius to enter into the spirit of a poet. But Aristotle
' was out of all patience with the account I gave him of Scotus and Ramus, as
' I presented them to him ; and he asked them " whether the rest of the tribe
' were as great dunces as themselves ? " *

The Education of later life. ccix

not see that education is relative to the characters of individuals ; Republic.

he only desires to impress the same form of the state on the INTRODUC-
TION.

minds of all. He has no sufficient idea of the effect of litera-
ture on the formation of the mind, and greatly exaggerates
that of mathematics. His aim is above all things to train
the reasoning faculties ; to implant in the mind the spirit
and power of abstraction ; to explain and define general notions,
and, if possible, to connect them. No wonder that in the vacancy
of actual knowledge his followers, and at times even he himself,
should have fallen away from the doctrine of ideas, and have
returned to that branch of knowledge in which alone the rela-
tion of the one and many can be truly seen — the science of number.
In his views both of teaching and training he might be styled,
in modern language, a doctrinaire ; after the Spartan fashion
he would have his citizens cast in one mould ; he does not seem
to consider that some degree of freedom, 'a little wholesome
neglect,' is necessary to strengthen and develope the character
and to give play to the individual nature. His citizens would
not have acquired that knowledge which in the vision of Er is sup-
posed to be gained by the pilgrims from their experience of evil.

On the other hand, Plato is far in advance of modern philo-
sophers and theologians when he teaches that education is to
be continued through life and will begin again in another. He
would never allow education of some kind to cease ; although
he was aware that the proverbial saying of Solon, * I grow old
learning many things,' cannot be applied literally. Himself
ravished with the contemplation of the idea of good, and de-
lighting in solid geometry (Rep. vii. 528), he has no difficulty
in imagining that a lifetime might be passed happily in such
pursuits. We who know how many more men of business
there are in the world than real students or thinkers, are not
equally sanguine. The education which he proposes for his
citizens is really the ideal life of the philosopher or man of
genius, interrupted, but only for a time, by practical duties, — a
life not for the many, but for the few.

Yet the thought of Plato may not be wholly incapable of ap-
plication to our own times. Even if regarded as an ideal which
can never be realized, it may have a great effect in elevating
the characters of mankind, and raising them above the routine

P

ccx The Education of later life.

Republic, of their ordinary occupation or profession. It is the best form
INTRODUC- under which we can conceive the whole of life. Nevertheless the

TION.

idea of Plato is not easily put into practice. For the education
of after life is necessarily the education which each one gives
himself. Men and women cannot be brought together in schools
or colleges at forty or fifty years of age ; and if they could the
result would be disappointing. The destination of most men is
what Plato would call ' the Den ' for the whole of life, and with
that they are content. Neither have they teachers or advisers
with whom they can take counsel in riper years. There is no
' schoolmaster abroad ' who will tell them of their faults, or in-
spire them with the higher sense of duty, or with the ambition
of a true success in life ; no Socrates who will convict them of
ignorance ; no Christ, or follower of Christ, who will reprove them
of sin. Hence they have a difficulty in receiving the first element
of improvement, which is self-knowledge. The hopes of youth no
longer stir them ; they rather wish to rest than to pursue high objects.
A few only who have come across great men and women, or eminent
teachers of religion and morality, have received a second life from
them, and have lighted a candle from the fire of their genius.

The want of energy is one of the main reasons why so few
persons continue to improve in later years. They have not the
will, and do not know the way. They ' never try an experiment,'
or look up a point of interest for themselves ; they make no sacri-
fices for the sake of knowledge ; their minds, like their bodies,
at a certain age become fixed. Genius has been defined as 'the
power of taking pains ' ; but hardly any one keeps up his interest
in knowledge throughout a whole life. The troubles of a family,
the business of making money, the demands of a profession de-
stroy the elasticity of the mind. The waxen tablet of the memory
which was once capable of receiving 'true thoughts and clear
impressions ' becomes hard and crowded ; there is not room for
the accumulations of a long life (Theaet. 194 ff.). The student, as
years advance, rather makes an exchange of knowledge than
adds to his stores. There is no pressing necessity to learn;
the stock of Classics or History or Natural Science which was
enough for a man at twenty-five is enough for him at fifty.
Neither is it easy to give a definite answer to any one who
asks how he is to improve. For self-education consists in a

The Education of later life. ccxi

thousand things, commonplace in themselves, — in adding to what Republic.
we are by nature something of what we are not ; in learning to
see ourselves as others see us ; in judging, not by opinion, but
by the evidence of facts ; in seeking out the society of superior
minds ; in a study of the lives and writings of great men ; in
observation of the world and character ; in receiving kindly the
natural influence of different times of life ; in any act or thought
which is raised above the practice or opinions of mankind; in
the pursuit of some new or original enquiry; in any effort of
mind which calls forth some latent power.

If any one is desirous of carrying out in detail the Platonic
education of after-life, some such counsels as the following may
be offered to him :— That he shall choose the branch of know-
ledge to which his own mind most distinctly inclines, and in
which he takes the greatest delight, either one which seems
to connect with his own daily employment, or, perhaps, fur-
nishes the greatest contrast to it. He may study from the
speculative side the profession or business in which he is practi-
cally engaged. He may make Homer, Dante, Shakespeare,
Plato, Bacon the friends and companions of his life. He may
find opportunities of hearing the living voice of a great teacher.
He may select for enquiry some point of history or some un-
explained phenomenon of nature. An hour a day passed in
such scientific or literary pursuits will furnish as many facts
as the memory can retain, and will give him ' a pleasure not to
be repented of (Timaeus, 59 D). Only let him beware of being
the slave of crotchets, or of running after a Will o' the Wisp in
his ignorance, or in his vanity of attributing to himself the gifts of
a poet or assuming the air of a philosopher. He should know
the limits of his own powers. Better to build up the mind by
slow additions, to creep on quietly from one thing to another,
to gain insensibly new powers and new interests in knowledge,
than to form vast schemes which are never destined to be
realized. But perhaps, as Plato would say, 'This is part of
another subject ' (Tim. 87 B) ; though we may also defend our
digression by his example (Theaet. 72, 77).

IV. We remark with surprise that the progress of nations or

P2

ccx

The Progress of the World.

Republic, the natural growth of institutions which fill modern treatises on
UC" Pontical philosophy seem hardly ever to have attracted the atten-
tion of Plato and Aristotle. The ancients were familiar with the
mutability of human affairs ; they could moralize over the ruins of
cities and the fall of empires (cp. Plato, Statesman 301, 302, and
Sulpicius' Letter to Cicero, Ad Fam. iv. 5) ; by them fate and
chance were deemed to be real powers, almost persons, and to
have had a great share in political events. The wiser of them
like Thucydides believed that 'what had been would be again,'
and that a tolerable idea of the future could be gathered from the
past. Also they had dreams of a Golden Age which existed once
upon a time and might still exist in some unknown land, or might
return again in the remote future. But the regular growth of a
state enlightened by experience, progressing in knowledge, im-
proving in the arts, of which the citizens were educated by the
fulfilment of political duties, appears never to have come within
the range of their hopes and aspirations. Such a state had never
been seen, and therefore could not be conceived by them. Their
experience (cp. Aristot. Metaph. xi. 21 ; Plato, Laws iii. 676-9)
led them to conclude that there had been cycles of civilization in
which the arts had been discovered and lost many times over,
and cities had been overthrown and rebuilt again and again, and
deluges and volcanoes and other natural convulsions had altered
the face of the earth. Tradition told them of many destructions
of mankind and of the preservation of a remnant. The world
began again after a deluge and was reconstructed out of the
fragments of itself. Also they were acquainted with empires of
unknown antiquity, like the Egyptian or Assyrian ; but they had
never seen them grow, and could not imagine, any more than
we can, the state of man which preceded them. They were
puzzled and awestricken by the Egyptian monuments, of which
the forms, as Plato says, not in a figure, but literally, were ten
thousand years old (Laws ii. 656 E), and they contrasted the an-
tiquity of Egypt with their own short memories.

The early legends of Hellas have no real connection with the
later history : they are at a distance, and the intermediate region
is concealed from view ; there is no road or path which leads from
one to the other. At the beginning of Greek history, in the
vestibule of the temple, is seen standing first of all the figure of

The Progress of the World. ccxiii

the legislator, himself the interpreter and servant of the God. Republic,
The fundamental laws which he gives are not supposed to change
with time and circumstances. The salvation of the state is held
rather to depend on the inviolable maintenance of them. They
were sanctioned by the authority of heaven, and it was deemed
impiety to alter them. The desire to maintain them unaltered
seems to be the origin of what at first sight is very surprising
to us — the intolerant zeal of Plato against innovators in religion
or politics (cp. Laws x. 907-9) ; although with a happy incon-
sistency he is also willing that the laws of other countries should
be studied and improvements in legislation privately communi-
cated to the Nocturnal Council (Laws xii. 951, 2). The additions
which were made to them in later ages in order to meet the
increasing complexity of affairs were still ascribed by a fiction
to the original legislator; and the words of such enactments at
Athens were disputed over as if they had been the words of
Solon himself. Plato hopes to preserve in a later generation the
mind of the legislator ; he would have his citizens remain within
the lines which he has laid down for them. He would not harass
them with minute regulations, and he would have allowed some
changes in the laws : but not changes which would affect the
fundamental institutions of the state, such for example as would
convert an aristocracy into a timocracy, or a timocracy into a
popular form of government.

Passing from speculations to facts, we observe that progress
has been the exception rather than the law of human history.
And therefore we are not surprised to find that the idea of pro-
gress is of modern rather than of ancient date ; and, like the idea
of a philosophy of history, is not more than a century or two old.
It seems to have arisen out of the impression left on the human
mind by the growth of the Roman Empire and of the Christian
Church, and to be due to the political and social improvements
which they introduced into the world ; and still more in our own
century to the idealism of the first French Revolution and the
triumph of American Independence ; and in a yet greater degree
to the vast material prosperity and growth of population in
England and her colonies and in America. It is also to be
ascribed in a measure to the greater study of the philosophy of
history. The optimist temperament of some great writers has

ccxiv The Republic and the Laws.

Republic, assisted the creation of it, while the opposite character has led a
INTRODUC- few to regard the future of the world as dark. The ' spectator of
all time and of all existence ' sees more of ' the increasing purpose
which through the ages ran ' than formerly : but to the inhabitant
of a small state of Hellas the vision was necessarily limited like
the valley in which he dwelt. There was no remote past on
which his eye could rest, nor any future from which the veil
was partly lifted up by the analogy of history. The narrowness
of view, which to ourselves appears so singular, was to him
natural, if not unavoidable.

V. For the relation of the Republic to the Statesman and the
Laws, the two other works of Plato which directly treat of politics,
see the Introductions to the two latter ; a few general points of
comparison may be touched upon in this place.

And first of the Laws, (i) The Republic, though probably
written at intervals, yet speaking generally and judging by the
indications of thought and style, may be reasonably ascribed to
the middle period of Plato's life : the Laws are certainly the work
of his declining years, and some portions of them at any rate seem
to have been written in extreme old age. (2) The Republic is
full of hope and aspiration : the Laws bear the stamp of failure
and disappointment. The one is a finished work which received
the last touches of the author : the other is imperfectly executed,
and apparently unfinished. The one has the grace and beauty of
youth : the other has lost the poetical form, but has more of the
severity and knowledge of life which is characteristic of old age.
(3) The most conspicuous defect of the Laws is the failure of
dramatic power, whereas the Republic is full of striking contrasts
of ideas and oppositions of character. (4) The Laws may be said
to have more the nature of a sermon, the Republic of a poem ;
the one is more religious, the other more intellectual. (5) Many
theories of Plato, such as the doctrine of ideas, the government
of the world by philosophers, are not found in the Laws ; the
immortality of the soul is first mentioned in xii. 959, 967 ; the
person of Socrates has altogether disappeared. The community
of women and children is renounced ; the institution of common
or public meals for women (Laws vi. 781) is for the first time intro-

The Republic and the Laws. ccxv

duced (Ar. Pol. ii. 6, § 5). (6) There remains in the Laws the old Republic.
enmity to the poets (vii. 817), who are ironically saluted in high- INTRODUC-
flown terms, and, at the same time, are peremptorily ordered out
of the city, if they are not willing to submit their poems to the
censorship of the magistrates (cp. Rep. iii. 398). (7) Though the
work is in most respects inferior, there are a few passages in the
Laws, such as v. 727 ff. (the honour due to the soul), viii. 835 ff.
(the evils of licentious or unnatural love), the whole of Book x.
(religion), xi. 918 ff. (the dishonesty of retail trade), and 923 ff.
(bequests), which come more home to us, and contain more of
what may be termed the modern element in Plato than almost
anything in the Republic.

The relation of the two works to one another is very well given :
(i) by Aristotle in the Politics (ii. 6, §§ 1-5) from the side of
the Laws : —

'The same, or nearly the same, objections apply to Plato's
' later work, the Laws, and therefore we had better examine briefly
'the constitution which is therein described. In the Republic,
' Socrates has definitely settled in all a few questions only ; such
'as the community of women and children, the community of
'property, and the constitution of the state. The population is
' divided into two classes — one of husbandmen, and the other of
' warriors ; from this latter is taken a third class of counsellors
' and rulers of the state. But Socrates has not determined whether
'the husbandmen and artists are to have a share in the govern-
'ment, and whether they too are to carry arms and share in
'military service or not. He certainly thinks that the women
'ought to share in the education of the guardians, and to fight
'by their side. The remainder of the work is filled up with
'digressions foreign to the main subject, and with discussions
'about the education of the guardians. In the Laws there is
' hardly anything but laws ; not much is said about the constitution.
' This, which he had intended to make more of the ordinary type,
' he gradually brings round to the other or ideal form. For with
'the exception of the community of women and property, he
' supposes everything to be the same in both states ; there is to be
' the same education ; the citizens of both are to live free from
' servile occupations, and there are to be common meals in both.
' The only difference is that in the Laws the common meals are

ccxvi The Republk and the Laws.

Republic. ' extended to women, and the warriors number about 5000, but in
INTRODUC- < the Republic only 1000.'

TION. J

(ii) by Plato in the Laws (Book v. 739 B-E), from the side of
the Republic : —

' The first and highest form of the state and of the government
'and of the law is that in which there prevails most widely the
' ancient saying that " Friends have all things in common." Whether
' there is now, or ever will be, this communion of women and
'children and of property, in which the private and individual
' is altogether banished from life, and things which are by nature

* private, such as eyes and ears and hands, have become common,

* and all men express praise and blame, and feel joy and sorrow,
' on the same occasions, and the laws unite the city to the utmost, —
' whether all this is possible or not, I say that no man, acting upon
' any other principle, will ever constitute a state more exalted in
'virtue, or truer or better than this. Such a state, whether in-
' habited by Gods or sons of Gods, will make them blessed who
' dwell therein ; and therefore to this we are to look for the pattern
1 of the state, and to cling to this, and, as far as possible, to seek
' for one which is like this. The state which we have now in hand,
'when created, will be nearest to immortality and unity in the
' next degree ; and after that, by the grace of God, we will com-
' plete the third one. And we will begin by speaking of the nature
1 and origin of the second.'

The comparatively short work called the Statesman or Politicus
in its style and manner is more akin to the Laws, while in its
idealism it rather resembles the Republic. As far as we can
judge by various indications of language and thought, it must
be later than the one and of course earlier than the other. In
both the Republic and Statesman a close connection is maintained
between Politics and Dialectic. In the Statesman, enquiries into
the principles of Method are interspersed with discussions about
Politics. The comparative advantages of the rule of law and of
a person are considered, and the decision given in favour of a
person (Arist. Pol. iii. 15, 16). But much may be said on the other
side, nor is the opposition necessary ; for a person may rule by law,
and law may be so applied as to be the living voice of the legis-
lator. As in the Republic, there is a myth, describing, however,
not a future, but a former existence of mankind. The question is

Cicero s De Republica. ccxvii

asked, ' Whether the state of innocence which is described in the Republic.
myth, or a state like our own which possesses art and science and INTRODU<>
distmguishes good from evil, is the preferable condition of man.'
To this question of the comparative happiness of civilized and
primitive life, which was so often discussed in the last century and
in our own, no answer is given. The Statesman, though less
perfect in style than the Republic and of far less range, may
justly be regarded as one of the greatest of Plato's dialogues.

VI. Others as well as Plato have chosen an ideal Republic to
be the vehicle of thoughts which they could not definitely express,
or which went beyond their own age. The classical writing
which approaches most nearly to the Republic of Plato is the
* De Republica ' of Cicero ; but neither in this nor in any other
of his dialogues does he rival the art of Plato. The manners are
clumsy and inferior ; the hand of the rhetorician is apparent at
every turn. Yet noble sentiments are constantly recurring : the
true note of Roman patriotism — ' We Romans are a great people '
— resounds through the whole work. Like Socrates, Cicero turns
away from the phenomena of the heavens to civil and political
life. He would rather not discuss the 'two Suns' of which all
Rome was talking, when he can converse about ' the two nations
in one' which had divided Rome ever since the days of the
Gracchi. Like Socrates again, speaking in the person of Scipio,
he is afraid lest he should assume too much the character of a
teacher, rather than of an equal who is discussing among friends
the two sides of a question. He would confine the terms King
or State to the rule of reason and justice, and he will not concede
that title either to a democracy or to a monarchy. But under
the rule of reason and justice he is willing to include the natural
superior ruling over the natural inferior, which he compares to
the soul ruling over the body. He prefers a mixture of forms
of government to any single one. The two portraits of the just
and the unjust, which occur in the second book of the Republic,
are transferred to the state — Philus, one of the interlocutors,
maintaining against his will the necessity of injustice as a
principle of government, while the other, Laelius, supports the
opposite thesis. His views of language and number are derived

ccxviii St. Augustine s De Civitate Dei.

v>

Republic, from Plato ; like him he denounces the drama. He also declares
t^ia* ^ kis ^e were to be twice as long he would have no time
to read the lyric poets. The picture of democracy is translated
by him word for word, though he has hardly shown himself able
to '.carry the jest ' of Plato. He converts into a stately sentence
the humorous fancy about the animals, who ' are so imbued with
the spirit of democracy that they make the passers-by get out
of their way' (i. 42). His description of the tyrant is imitated
from Plato, but is far inferior. The second book is historical,
and claims for the Roman constitution (which is to him the ideal)
a foundation of fact such as Plato probably intended to have given
to the Republic in the Critias. His most remarkable imitation
of Plato is the adaptation of the vision of Er, which is converted
by Cicero into the ' Somnium Scipionis ' ; he has ' romanized '
the myth of the Republic, adding an argument for the immortality
of the soul taken from the Phaedrus, and some other touches
derived from the Phaedo and the Timaeus. Though a beautiful
tale and containing splendid passages, the ' Somnium Scipionis ' is
very inferior to the vision of Er ; it is only a dream, and hardly
allows the reader to suppose that the writer believes in his own
creation. Whether his dialogues were framed on the model of
the lost dialogues of Aristotle, as he himself tells us, or of Plato,
to which they bear many superficial resemblances, he is still the
Roman orator; he is not conversing, but making speeches, and
is never able to mould the intractable Latin to the grace and
ease of the Greek Platonic dialogue. But if he is defective in
form, much more is he inferior to the Greek in matter; he no-
where in his philosophical writings leaves upon our minds the
impression of an original thinker.

Plato's Republic has been said to be a church and not a state ;
and such an ideal of a city in the heavens has always hovered
over the Christian world, and is embodied in St. Augustine's ' De
Civitate Dei,' which is suggested by the decay and fall of the
Roman Empire, much in the same manner in which we may
imagine the Republic of Plato to have been influenced by the
decline of Greek politics in the writer's own age. The difference
is that in the time of Plato the degeneracy, though certain, was
gradual and insensible: whereas the taking of Rome by the
Goths stirred like an earthquake the age of St. Augustine. Men

St. Augustine s De Civitate Dei. ccxix

were inclined to believe that the overthrow of the city was to be Republic.
ascribed to the anger felt by the old Roman deities at the neglect
of their worship. St. Augustine maintains the opposite thesis ;
he argues that the destruction of the Roman Empire is due,
not to the rise of Christianity, but to the vices of Paganism.
He wanders over Roman history, and over Greek philosophy
and mythology, and finds everywhere crime, impiety and false-
hood. He compares the worst parts of the Gentile religions
with the best elements of the faith of Christ. He shows nothing
of the spirit which led others of the early Christian Fathers to
recognize in the writings of the Greek philosophers the power of
the divine truth. He traces the parallel of the kingdom of God,
that is, the history of the Jews, contained in their scriptures,
and of the kingdoms of the world, which are found in gentile
writers, and pursues them both into an ideal future. It need
hardly be remarked that his use both of Greek and of Roman
historians and of the sacred writings of the Jews is wholly
uncritical. The heathen mythology, the Sybilline oracles, the
myths of Plato, the dreams of Neo-Platonists are equally regarded
by him as matter of fact. He must be acknowledged to be a
strictly polemical or controversial writer who makes the best
of everything on one side and the worst of everything on the
other. He has no sympathy with the old Roman life as Plato
has with Greek life, nor has he any idea of the ecclesiastical
kingdom which was to arise out of the ruins of the Roman
empire. He is not blind to the defects of the Christian Church,
and looks forward to a time when Christian and Pagan shall be
alike brought before the judgment-seat, and the true City of God
shall appear. . . . The work of St. Augustine is a curious repertory
of antiquarian learning and quotations, deeply penetrated with
Christian ethics, but showing little power of reasoning, and a
slender knowledge of the Greek literature and language. He
was a great genius, and a noble character, yet hardly capable of
feeling or understanding anything external to his own theology.
Of all the ancient philosophers he is most attracted by Plato,
though he is very slightly acquainted with his writings. He
is inclined to believe that the idea of creation in the Timaeus is
derived from the narrative in Genesis ; and he is strangely taken
with the coincidence (?) of Plato's saying that 'the philosopher

TION.

ccxx Dante s De Monarchia.

Republic, is the lover of God,' and the words of the Book of Exodus
IN™°°UC- in which God reveals himself to Moses (Exod. iii. 14). He
dwells at length on miracles performed in his own day, of which
the evidence is regarded by him as irresistible. He speaks in a
very interesting manner of the beauty and utility of nature and
of the human frame, which he conceives to aiford a foretaste
of the heavenly state and of the resurrection of the body. The
book is not really what to most persons the title of it would
imply, and belongs to an age which- has passed away. But it
contains many fine passages and thoughts which are for all
time.

The short treatise de Monarchia of Dante is by far the most
remarkable of mediaeval ideals, and bears the impress of the
great genius in whom Italy and the Middle Ages are so vividly
reflected. It is the vision of an Universal Empire, which is
supposed to be the natural and necessary government of the
world, having a divine authority distinct from the Papacy, yet
coextensive with it. It is not 'the ghost of the dead Roman
Empire sitting crowned upon the grave thereof/ but the legitimate
heir and successor of it, justified by the ancient virtues of the
Romans and the beneficence of their rule. Their right to be
the governors of the world is also confirmed by the testimony
of miracles, and acknowledged by St. Paul when he appealed
to Caesar, and even more emphatically by Christ Himself, Who
could not have made atonement for the sins of men if He had
not been condemned by a divinely authorized tribunal. The
necessity for the establishment of an Universal Empire is proved
partly by a priori arguments such as the unity of God and the
unity of the family or nation ; partly by perversions of Scripture
and history, by false analogies of nature, by misapplied quotations
from the classics, and by odd scraps and commonplaces of logic,
showing a familiar but by no means exact knowledge of Aristotle
(of Plato there is none). But a more convincing argument still
is the miserable state of the world, which he touchingly describes.
He sees no hope of happiness or peace for mankind until all
nations of the earth are comprehended in a single empire. The
whole treatise shows how deeply the idea of the Roman Empire
was fixed in the minds of his contemporaries. Not much argument
was needed to maintain the truth of a theory which to his own

Sir Thomas Mores Utopia. ccxxi

contemporaries seemed so natural and congenial. He speaks, Republic.
or rather preaches, from the point of view, not of the ecclesiastic, INTRODUC-
but of the layman, although, as a good Catholic, he is willing
to acknowledge that in certain respects the Empire must submit
to the Church. The beginning and end of all his noble reflections
and of his arguments, good and bad, is the aspiration, 'that in
this little plot of earth belonging to mortal man life may pass
in freedom and peace.' So inextricably is his vision of the future
bound up with the beliefs and circumstances of his own age.

The 'Utopia' of Sir Thomas More is a surprising monument
of his genius, and shows a reach of thought far beyond his
contemporaries. The book was written by him at the age of
about 34 or 35, and is full of the generous sentiments of youth.
He brings the light of Plato to bear upon the miserable state
of his own country. Living not long after the Wars of the
Roses, and in the dregs of the Catholic Church in England, he
is indignant at the corruption of the clergy, at the luxury of the
nobility and gentry, at the sufferings of the poor, at the calamities
caused by war. To the eye of More the whole world was
in dissolution and decay; and side by side with the misery
and oppression which he has described in the First Book of the
Utopia, he places in the Second Book the ideal state which by
the help of Plato he had constructed. The times were full of
stir and intellectual interest. The distant murmur of the Re-
formation was beginning to be heard. To minds like More's,
Greek literature was a revelation : there had arisen an art of inter-
pretation, and the New Testament was beginning to be understood
as it had never been before, and has not often been since, in its
natural sense. The life there depicted appeared to him wholly
unlike that of Christian commonwealths, in which 'he saw
nothing but a certain conspiracy of rich men procuring their
own commodities under the name and title of the Commonwealth.'
He thought that Christ, like Plato, ' instituted all things common/
for which reason, he tells us, the citizens of Utopia were the
more willing to receive his doctrines1. The community of

1 ' Howbeit, I think this was no small help and furtherance in the matter,
that they heard us say that Christ instituted among his, all things common, and
that the same community doth yet remain in the rightest Christian com-
munities ' (Utopia, English Reprints, p. 144).

ccxxii Sir Thomas More 5 Utopia.

Republic, property is a fixed idea with him, though he is aware of the

INTRODUC- arguments which may be urged on the other side \ We wonder

how in the reign of Henry VIII, though veiled in another language

and published in a foreign country, such speculations could have

been endured.

He is gifted with far greater dramatic invention than any one
who succeeded him, with the exception of Swift. In the art of
feigning he is a worthy disciple of Plato. Like him, starting from
a small portion of fact, he founds his tale with admirable skill on a
few lines in the Latin narrative of the voyages of Amerigo
Vespucci. He is very precise about dates and facts, and has the
power of making us believe that the narrator of the tale must have
been an eyewitness. We are fairly puzzled by his manner of
mixing up real and imaginary persons ; his boy John Clement and
Peter Giles, the citizen of Antwerp, with whom he disputes about
the precise words which are supposed to have been used by the
(imaginary) Portuguese traveller, Raphael Hythloday. 'I have
the more cause,' says Hythloday, ' to fear that my words shall not
be believed, for that I know how difficultly and hardly I myself
would have believed another man telling the same, if I had not
myself seen it with mine own eyes.' Or again : 'If you had been
with me in Utopia, and had presently seen their fashions and laws
as I did which lived there five years and more, and would never
have come thence, but only to make the new land known here,'
etc. More greatly regrets that he forgot to ask Hythloday in what
part of the world Utopia is situated ; he ' would have spent no
small sum of money rather than it should have escaped him/ and
he begs Peter Giles to see Hythloday or write to him and obtain
an answer to the question. After this we are not surprised to
hear that a Professor of Divinity (perhaps ' a late famous vicar of
Croydon in Surrey,' as the translator thinks) is desirous of being
sent thither as a missionary by the High Bishop, ' yea, and that he
may himself be made Bishop of Utopia, nothing doubting that he
must obtain this Bishopric with suit ; and he counteth that a godly

1 ' These things (I say), when I consider with myself, I hold well with Plato,
and do nothing marvel that he would make no laws for them that refused those
laws, whereby all men should have and enjoy equal portions of riches and
commodities. For the wise man did easily foresee this to be the one and only
way to the wealth of a community, if equality of all things should be brought
in and established' (Utopia, English Reprints, pp. 67, 68).

Sir Thomas Mores Utopia. ccxxiii

suit which proceedeth not of the desire of honour or lucre, but Republic.
only of a godly zeal.' The design may have failed through the
disappearance of Hythloday, concerning whom we have 'very
uncertain news ' after his departure. There is no doubt, however,
that he had told More and Giles the exact situation of the island,
but unfortunately at the same moment More's attention, as he is
reminded in a letter from Giles, was drawn off by a servant, and
one of the company from a cold caught on shipboard coughed so
loud as to prevent Giles from hearing. And 'the secret has
perished' with him; to this day the place of Utopia remains
unknown.

The words of Phaedrus (275 B), ' O Socrates, you can easily
invent Egyptians or anything,' are recalled to our mind as we read
this lifelike fiction. Yet the greater merit of the work is not the
admirable art, but the originality of thought. More is as free as
Plato from the prejudices of his age, and far more tolerant. The
Utopians do not allow him who believes not in the immortality of
the soul to share in the administration of the state (cp. Laws x.
908 foil.), ' howbeit they put him to no punishment, because they
be persuaded that it is in no man's power to believe what he list ' ;
and ' no man is to be blamed for reasoning in support of his own
religion V In the public services * no prayers be used, but such as
every man may boldly pronounce without giving offence to any
sect.' He says significantly (p. 143), ' There be that give worship
to a man that was once of excellent virtue or of famous glory, not
only as God, but also the chiefest and highest God. But the most
and the wisest part, rejecting all these, believe that there is a certain
godly power unknown, far above the capacity and reach of man's
wit, dispersed throughout all the world, not in bigness, but in
virtue and power. Him they call the Father of all. To Him
alone they attribute the beginnings, the increasings, the proceed-

1 ' One of our company in my presence was sharply punished. He, as soon
as he was baptised, began, against our wills, with more earnest affection than
wisdom, to reason of Christ's religion, and began to wax so hot in his matter,
that he did not only prefer our religion before all other, but also did despise
and condemn all other, calling them profane, and the followers of them wicked
and devilish, and the children of everlasting damnation. When he had thus
long reasoned the matter, they laid hold on him, accused him, and condemned
him into exile, not as a despiser of religion, but as a seditious person and a
raiser up of dissension among the people ' (p. 145).

ccxxiv Sir Thomas Mores Utopia.

Republic, ings, the changes, and the ends of all things. Neither give they
INTRODUC- any divine honours to any other than him.' So far was More from

T10N. J

sharing the popular beliefs of his time. Yet at the end he reminds
us that he does not in all respects agree with the customs and
opinions of the Utopians which he describes. And we should let
him have the benefit of this saving clause, and not rudely withdraw
the veil behind which he has been pleased to conceal himself.

Nor is he less in advance of popular opinion in his political and
moral speculations. He would like to bring military glory into
contempt; he wou.ld set all sorts of idle people to profitable
occupation, including in the same class, priests, women, noblemen,
gentlemen, and ' sturdy and valiant beggars,' that the labour of all
may be reduced to six hours a day. His dislike of capital punish-
ment, and plans for the reformation of offenders ; his detestation of
priests and lawyers * ; his remark that ' although every one may
hear of ravenous dogs and wolves and cruel man-eaters, it is not
easy to find states that are well and wisely governed,' are curiously
at variance with the notions of his age and indeed with his own life.
There are many points in which he shows a modern feeling and a
prophetic insight like Plato. He is a sanitary reformer ; he main-
tains that civilized states have a right to the soil of waste countries ;
he is inclined to the opinion which places happiness in virtuous
pleasures, but herein, as he thinks, not disagreeing from those
other philosophers who define virtue to be a life according to
nature. He extends the idea of happiness so as to include the
happiness of others ; and he argues ingeniously, ' All men agree
that we ought to make others happy; but if others, how much
more ourselves ! ' And still he thinks that there may be a more
excellent way, but to this no man's reason can attain unless heaven
should inspire him with a higher truth. His ceremonies before
marriage ; his humane proposal that war should be carried on
by assassinating the leaders of the enemy, may be compared to
some of the paradoxes of Plato. He has a charming fancy, like
the affinities of Greeks and barbarians in the Timaeus, that the
Utopians learnt the language of the Greeks with the more readi-
ness because they were originally of the same race with them. He
is penetrated with the spirit of Plato, and quotes or adapts many

1 Compare his satirical observation : ' They (the Utopians) have priests of
exceeding holiness, and therefore very few ' (p. 1 50).

Sir Thomas Mores Utopia. ccxxv

thoughts both from the Republic and from the Timaeus. He pre- Republic.
fers public duties to private, and is somewhat impatient of the
importunity of relations. His citizens have no silver or gold of
their own, but are ready enough to pay them to their mercenaries
(cp. Rep. iv. 422, 423). There is nothing of which he is more con-
temptuous than the love of money. Gold is used for fetters of
criminals, and diamonds and pearls for children's necklaces \

Like Plato he is full of satirical reflections on governments and
princes ; on the state of the world and of knowledge. The hero
of his discourse (Hythloday) is very unwilling to become a minister
of state, considering that he would lose his independence and his
advice would never be heeded 2. He ridicules the new logic of his
time; the Utopians could never be made to understand the
doctrine of Second Intentions s. He is very severe on the sports
of the gentry ; the Utopians count ' hunting the lowest, the vilest,
and the most abject part of butchery.' He quotes the words of
the Republic in which the philosopher is described ' standing out
of the way under a wall until the driving storm of sleet and rain
be overpast,' which admit of a singular application to More's own
fate ; although, writing twenty years before (about the year 1514),

1 When the ambassadors came arrayed in gold and peacocks' feathers ' to
the eyes of all the Utopians except very few, which had been in other countries
for some reasonable cause, all that gorgeousness of apparel seemed shameful
and reproachful. In so much that they most reverently saluted the vilest and
most abject of them for lords — passing over the ambassadors themselves with-
out any honour, judging them by their wearing of golden chains to be bondmen.
You should have seen children also, that had cast away their pearls and
precious stones, when they saw the like sticking upon the ambassadors' caps,
dig and push their mothers under the sides, saying thus to them — " Look,
mother, how great a lubber doth yet wear pearls and precious stones, as
though he were a little child still." But the mother ; yea and that also in
good earnest: "Peace, son," saith she, "I think he be some of the ambas-
sadors' fools " ' (p. 102).

3 Cp. an exquisite passage at p. 35, of which the conclusion is as follows:
' And verily it is naturally given . . . suppressed and ended.'

3 ' For they have not devised one of all those rules of restrictions, amplifica-
tions, and suppositions, very wittily invented in the small Logicals, which
here our children in every place do learn. Furthermore, they were never yet
able to find out the second intentions ; insomuch that none of them all could
ever see man himself in common, as they call him, though he be (as you know)
bigger than was ever any giant, yea, and pointed to of us even with our finger '
(P- 105).

ccxxvi The New Atlantis: The City of the Sun.

Republic, he can hardly be supposed to have foreseen this. There is no
IN™ON.UC* toucn °f satire which strikes deeper than his quiet remark that the
greater part of the precepts of Christ are more at variance with
the lives of ordinary Christians than the discourse of Utopia \

The 'New Atlantis' is only a fragment, and far inferior in
merit to the ' Utopia.' The work is full of ingenuity, but wanting
in creative fancy, and by no means impresses the reader with
a sense of credibility. In some places Lord Bacon is character-
istically different from Sir Thomas More, as, for example, in the
external state which he attributes to the governor of Solomon's
House, whose dress he minutely describes, while to Sir Thomas
More such trappings appear simply ridiculous. Yet, after this
programme of dress, Bacon adds the beautiful trait, ' that he had a
look as though he pitied men.' Several things are borrowed by
him from the Timaeus ; but he has injured the unity of style by
adding thoughts and passages which are taken from the Hebrew
Scriptures.

The 'City of the Sun,' written by Campanella (1568-1639),
a Dominican friar, several years after the 'New Atlantis' of
Bacon, has many resemblances to the Republic of Plato. The
citizens have wives and children in common; their marriages
are of the same temporary sort, and are arranged by the magis-
trates from time to time. They do not, however, adopt his
system of lots, but bring together the best natures, male and
female, ' according to philosophical rules.' The infants until
two years of age are brought up by their mothers in public
temples; and since individuals for the most part educate their
children badly, at the beginning of their third year they are
committed to the care of the State, and are taught at first, not out
of books, but from paintings of all kinds, which are emblazoned
on the walls of the city. The city has six interior circuits of
walls, and an outer wall which is the seventh. On this outer
wall are painted the figures of legislators and philosophers, and

1 ' And yet the most part of them is more dissident from the manners of the
world now a days, than my communication was. But preachers, sly and wily
men, following your counsel (as I suppose) because they saw men evil-willing
to frame their manners to Christ's rule, they have wrested and wried his
doctrine, and, like a rule of lead, have applied it to men's manners, that by
some means at the least way, they might agree together' (p. 66).

The City of the Sun. ccxxvii

on each of the interior walls the symbols or forms of some one Republic.

of the sciences are delineated. The women are, for the most INTRODUC-
TION.
part, trained, like the men, in warlike and other exercises ; but

they have two special occupations of their own. After a battle,
they and the boys soothe and relieve the wounded warriors ;
also they encourage them with embraces and pleasant words
(cp. Plato, Rep. v. 468). Some elements of the Christian or
Catholic religion are preserved among them. The life of the
Apostles is greatly admired by this people because they had
all things in common; and the short prayer which Jesus Christ
taught men is used in their worship. It is a duty of the chief
magistrates to pardon sins, and therefore the whole people make
secret confession of them to the magistrates, and they to their
chief, who is a sort of Rector Metaphysicus ; and by this means
he is well informed ol all that is going on in the minds of men.
After confession, absolution is granted to the citizens collectively,
but no one is mentioned by name. There also exists among
them a practice of perpetual prayer, performed by a succession of
priests, who change every hour. Their religion is a worship
of God in Trinity, that is of Wisdom, Love and Power, but
without any distinction of persons. They behold in the sun
the reflection of His glory ; mere graven images they reject,
refusing to fall under the ' tyranny ' of idolatry.

Many details are given about their customs of eating and
drinking, about their mode of dressing, their employments, their
wars. Campanella looks forward to a new mode of education,
which is to be a study of nature, and not of Aristotle. He would
not have his citizens waste their time in the consideration of
what he calls ' the dead signs of things.' He remarks that he
who knows one science only, does not really know that one
any more than the rest, and insists strongly on the necessity
of a variety of knowledge. More scholars are turned out in the
City of the Sun in one year than by contemporary methods in
ten or fifteen. He evidently believes, like Bacon, that hence-
forward natural science will play a great part in education, a
hope which seems hardly to have been realized, either in our own
or in any former age ; at any rate the fulfilment of it has been
long deferred.

There is a good deal of ingenuity and even originality in this

ccxxviii Eliot's Monarchy of Man.

Republic, work, and a most enlightened spirit pervades it. But it has
INTRODUC- little or no charm of style, and falls very far short of the ' New

TION.

Atlantis' of Bacon, and still more of the ' Utopia' of Sir Thomas
More. It is full of inconsistencies, and though borrowed from
Plato, shows but a superficial acquaintance with his writings. It
is a work such as one might expect to have been written by a
philosopher and man of genius who was also a friar, and who had
spent twenty-seven years of his life in a prison of the Inquisition.
The most interesting feature of the book, common to Plato
and Sir Thomas More, is the deep feeling which is shown by
the writer, of the misery and ignorance prevailing among the
lower classes in his own time. Campanella takes note of Aris-
totle's answer to Plato's community of property, that in a society
where all things are common, no individual would have any
motive to work (Arist. Pol. ii. 5, § 6) : he replies, that his citizens
being happy and contented in themselves (they are required to
work only four hours a day), will have greater regard for their
fellows than exists among men at present. He thinks, like Plato,
that if he abolishes private feelings and interests, a great public
feeling will take their place.

Other writings on ideal states, such as the ' Oceana ' of Harring-
ton, in which the Lord Archon, meaning Cromwell, is described,
not as he was, but as he ought to have been ; or the ' Argenis ' of
Barclay, which is an historical allegory of his own time, are
too unlike Plato to be worth mentioning. More interesting than
either of these, and far more Platonic in style and thought, is
Sir John Eliot's 'Monarchy of Man,' in which the prisoner of
the Tower, no longer able * to be a politician in the land of his
birth,' turns away from politics to view 'that other city which
is within him,' and finds on the very threshold of the grave
that the secret of human happiness is the mastery of self. The
change of government in the time of the English Commonwealth
set men thinking about first principles, and gave rise to many
works of this class. . . . The great original genius of Swift owes
nothing to Plato ; nor is there any trace in the conversation or
in the works of Dr. Johnson of any acquaintance with his writings.
He probably would have refuted Plato without reading him, in
the same fashion in which he supposed himself to have refuted
Bishop Berkeley's theory of the non-existence of matter. If we

The value of Ideals. ccxxix

except the so-called English Platonists, or rather Neo-Platonists, Republic.
who never understood their master, and the writings of Coleridge,
who was to some extent a kindred spirit, Plato has left no
permanent impression on English literature.

VII. Human life and conduct are affected by ideals in the same
way that they are aifected by the examples of eminent men.
Neither the one nor the other are immediately applicable to prac-
tice, but there is a virtue flowing from them which tends to raise
individuals above the common routine of society or trade, and
to elevate States above the mere interests of commerce or the
necessities of self-defence. Like the ideals of art they are
partly framed by the omission of particulars ; they require to
be viewed at a certain distance, and are apt to fade away if we
attempt to approach them. They gain an imaginary distinctness
when embodied in a State or in a system of philosophy, but they
still remain the visions of *a world unrealized.' More striking
and obvious to the ordinary mind are the examples of great men,
who have served their own generation and are remembered in
another. Even in our own family circle there may have been
some one, a woman, or even a child, in whose face has shone
forth a goodness more than human. The ideal then approaches
nearer to us, and we fondly cling to it. The ideal of the past,
whether of our own past lives or of former states of society, has
a singular fascination for the minds of many. Too late we learn
that such ideals cannot be recalled, though the recollection of them
may have a humanizing influence on other times. But the abstrac-
tions of philosophy are to most persons cold and vacant ; they give
light without warmth ; they are like the full moon in the heavens
when there are no stars appearing. Men cannot live by thought
alone ; the world of sense is always breaking in upon them. They
are for the most part confined to a corner of earth, and see but
a little way beyond their own home or place of abode ; they ' do
not lift up their eyes to the hills ' ; they are not awake when
the dawn appears. But in Plato we have reached a height from
which a man may look into the distance (Rep. iv. 445 C) and behold
the future of the world and of philosophy. The ideal of the
State and of the life of the philosopher ; the ideal of an education

ccxxx The future of the race and of the individual.

Republic, continuing through life and extending equally to both sexes ;
IN TRioNUC" tlie *deal °^ tne umtv and correlation of knowledge ; the faith in

good and immortality— are the vacant forms of light on which

Plato is seeking to fix the eye of mankind.

VIII. Two other ideals, which never appeared above the horizon
in Greek Philosophy, float before the minds of men in our own
day : one seen more clearly than formerly, as though each year
and each generation brought us nearer to some great change ; the
other almost in the same degree retiring from view behind the
laws of nature, as if oppressed by them, but still remaining a
silent hope of we know not what hidden in the heart of man. The
first ideal is the future of the human race in this world ; the
second the future of the individual in another. The first is the
more perfect realization of our own present life ; the second, the
abnegation of it : the one, limited by experience, the other,
transcending it. Both of them have been and are powerful
motives of action ; there are a few in whom they have taken the
place of all earthly interests. The hope of a future for the human
race at first sight seems to be the more disinterested, the hope
of individual existence the more egotistical, of the two motives.
But when men have learned to resolve their hope of a future
either for themselves or for the world into the will of God — ' not
my will but Thine,' the difference between them falls away ; and
they may be allowed to make either of them the basis of their
lives, according to their own individual character or temperament.
There is as much faith in the willingness to work for an unseen
future in this world as in another. Neither is it inconceivable
that some rare nature may feel his duty to another generation,
or to another century, almost as strongly as to his own, or that
living always in the presence of God, he may realize another
world as vividly as he does this.

The greatest of all ideals may, or rather must be conceived by
us under similitudes derived from human qualities ; although
sometimes, like the Jewish prophets, we may dash away these
figures of speech and describe the nature of God only in negatives.
These again by degrees acquire a positive meaning. It would
be well, if when meditating on the higher truths either of

The ideal of Divine goodness. ccxxxi

philosophy or religion, we sometimes substituted one form of Republic.
expression for another, lest through the necessities of language
we should become the slaves of mere words.

There is a third ideal, not the same, but akin to these, which has
a place in the home and heart of every believer in the religion of
Christ, and in which men seem to find a nearer and more familiar
truth, the Divine man, the Son of Man, the Saviour of mankind,
Who is the first-born and head of the whole family in heaven and
earth, in Whom the Divine and human, that which is without and
that which is within the range of our earthly faculties, are indisso-
lubly united. Neither is this divine form of goodness wholly
separable from the ideal of the Christian Church, which is said in
the New Testament to be ' His body,' or at variance with those
other images of good which Plato sets before us. We see Him in
a figure only, and of figures of speech we select but a few, and
those the simplest, to be the expression of Him. We behold Him
in a picture, but He is not there. We gather up the fragments of
His discourses, but neither do they represent Him as He truly
was. His dwelling is neither in heaven nor earth, but in the heart
of man. This is that image which Plato saw dimly in the distance,
which, when existing among men, he called, in the language of
Homer, ' the likeness of God ' (Rep. vi. 501 B), the likeness of a
nature which in all ages men have felt to be greater and better
than themselves, and which in endless forms, whether derived
from Scripture or nature, from the witness of history or from the
human heart, regarded as a person or not as a person, with or
without parts or passions, existing in space or not in space, is and
will always continue to be to mankind the Idea of Good.

THE REPUBLIC

BOOK I

PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE

SOCRATES, who is the narrator. CEPHALUS.

GLAUCON. THRASYMACHUS.

ADEIMANTUS. CLEITOPHON.
POLEMARCHUS.

And others who are mute auditors.

The scene is laid in the house of Cephalus at the Piraeus ; and the whole
dialogue is narrated by Socrates the day after it actually took place
to Timaeus, Hermocrates, Critias, and a nameless person, who are
introduced in the Timaeus.

Ed. T WENT down yesterday to the Piraeus with Glaucon Republic
327' A the son of Ariston, that I might offer up my prayers to 7*
the goddess * ; and also because I wanted to see in what SOCRATES,
manner they would celebrate the festival, which was a
new thing. I was delighted with the procession of the Crates °f
inhabitants ; but that of the Thracians was equally, if not and Giau-
more, beautiful. When we had finished our prayers and conwith
viewed the spectacle, we turned in the direction of the city ; archus
and at that instant Polemarchus the son of Cephalus chanced at the

Bendidean

to catch sight of us from a distance as we were starting on festival,
our way home, and told his servant to run and bid us wait
for him. The servant took hold of me by the cloak behind,
and said : Polemarchus desires you to wait.

I turned round, and asked him where his master was.

There he is, said the youth, coming after you, if you will
only wait.

1 Bendis, the Thracian Artemis.

The Home of Polemarchus.

Republic

SOCRATES,
POLEMAR-
CHUS,
GLAUCON,

ADEIMANTUS,
CEPHALUS.

The

equestrian

torch-race.

The

gathering
of friends
at the
house of
Cephalus.

Certainly we will, said Glaucon ; and in a few minutes
Polemarchus appeared, and with him Adeimantus, Glaucon's
brother, Niceratus the son of Nicias, and several others who
had been at the procession.

Polemarchus said to me : I perceive, Socrates, that you
and your companion are already on your way to the city.

You are not far wrong, I said.

But do you see, he rejoined, how many we are ?

Of course.

And are you stronger than all these ? for if not, you will
have to remain where you are.

May there not be the alternative, I said, that we may per-
suade you to let us go ?

But can you persuade us, if we refuse to listen to you ? he
said.

Certainly not, replied Glaucon.

Then we are not going to listen; of that you may be
assured.

Adeimantus added : Has no one told you of the torch-race 328
on horseback in honour of the goddess which will take place
in the evening ?

With horses ! I replied : That is a novelty. Will horse-
men carry torches and pass them one to another during the
race?

Yes, said Polemarchus, and not only so, but a festival will
be celebrated at night, which you certainly ought to see.
Let us rise soon after supper and see this festival ; there
will be a gathering of young men, and we will have a good
talk. Stay then, and do not be perverse.

Glaucon said : I suppose, since you insist, that we must.

Very good, I replied.

Accordingly we went with Polemarchus to his house ; and
there we found his brothers Lysias and Euthydemus, and
with them Thrasymachus the Chalcedonian, Charmantides
the Paeanian, and Cleitophon the son of Aristonymus. There
too was Cephalus the father of Polemarchus, whom I had
not seen for a long time, and I thought him very much aged.
He was seated on a cushioned chair, and had a garland on
his head, for he had been sacrificing in the court ; and there
were some other chairs in the room arranged in a semicircle,

The aged Cephalus. 3

upon which we sat down by him. He saluted me eagerly, Republic
and then he said : —

You don't come to see me, Socrates, as often as you ought : CEPHALVS«

J SOCRATES.

If I were still able to go and see you I would not ask you
to come to me. But at my age I can hardly get to the city,
and therefore you should come oftener to the Piraeus. For
let me tell you, that the more the pleasures of the body fade
away, the greater to me is the pleasure and charm of con-
versation. Do not then deny my request, but make our house
your resort and keep company with these young men ; we
are old friends, and you will be quite at home with us.

I replied : There is nothing which for my part I like better,
Cephalus, than conversing with aged, men; for I regard
them as travellers who have gone a journey which I too may
have to go, and of whom I ought to enquire, whether the way
is smooth and easy, or rugged and difficult. And this is a
question which I should like to ask of you who have arrived
at that time which the poets call the ' threshold of old age '
— Is life harder towards the end, or what report do you give
of it?

329 I will tell you, Socrates, he said, what my own feeling is. Old age is
Men of my age flock together ; we are birds of a feather, as blame for
the old proverb says ; and at our meetings the tale of my the troubles
acquaintance commonly is — I cannot eat, I cannot drink ; the
pleasures of youth and love are fled away : there was a good
time once, but now that is gone, and life is no longer life.
Some complain of the slights which are put upon them by
relations, and they will tell you sadly of how many evils their
old age is the cause. But to me, Socrates, these complainers
seem to blame that which is not really in fault. For if old
age were the cause, I too being old, and every other old
man, would have felt as they do. But this is not my own
experience, nor that of others whom I have known. How
well I remember the aged poet Sophocles, when in answer
to the question, How does love suit with age, Sophocles, —
are you still the man you were ? Peace, he replied ; most The excel-
gladly have I escaped the thing of which you speak; I feel
as if I had escaped from a mad and furious master. His cies.
words have often occurred to my mind since, and they seem
as good to me now as at the time when he uttered them.

B 2

4

Themistocles and the Seriphian.

Republic
L

CEPHALUS,
SOCRATES.

It is ad-
mitted that
the old, if
they are to
be comfort-
able, must
have a fair
share of
external
goods ;
neither
virtue alone
nor riches
alone can
make an
old man
happy.

Cephalus
has in-
herited
rather than
made a
fortune ; he
is therefore
indifferent
to money.

For certainly old age has a great sense of calm and freedom ;
when the passions relax their hold, then, as Sophocles says,
we are freed from the grasp not of one mad master only,
but of many. The truth is, Socrates, that these regrets, and
also the complaints about relations, are to be attributed to
the same cause, which is not old age, but men's characters
and tempers ; for he who is of a calm and happy nature will
hardly feel the pressure of age, but to him who is of an
opposite disposition youth and age are equally a burden.

I listened in admiration, and wanting to draw him out,
that he might go on — Yes, Cephalus, I said ; but I rather
suspect that people in general are not convinced by you
when you speak thus ; they think that old age sits lightly upon
you, not because of your happy disposition, but because you
are rich, and wealth is well known to be a great comforter.

You are right, he replied ; they are not convinced : and
there is something in what they say; not, however, so much
as they imagine. I might answer them as Themistocles
answered the Seriphian who was abusing him and saying
that he was famous, not for his own merits but because he
was an Athenian : ' If you had been a native of my country 330
or I of yours, neither of us would have been famous.' And to
those who are not rich and are impatient of old age, the
same reply may be made ; for to the good poor man old age
cannot be a light burden, nor can a bad rich man ever have
peace with himself.

May I ask, Cephalus, whether your fortune was for the
most part inherited or acquired by you ?

Acquired ! Socrates ; do you want to know how much I
acquired ? In the art of making money I have been midway
between my father and grandfather: for my grandfather,
whose name I bear, doubled and trebled the value of his
patrimony, that which he inherited being much what I
possess now ; but my father Lysaniasi reduced the property
below what it is at present : and I shall be satisfied if I leave
to these my sons not less but a little more than I received.

That was why I asked you the question, I replied, be-
cause I see that you are indifferent about money, which
is a characteristic rather of those who have inherited their
fortunes than of those who have acquired them ; the makers

The real Advantages of Wealth.

of fortunes have a second love of money as a creation of their Republic

own, resembling the affection of authors for their own poems,

or of parents for their children, besides that natural love of SOCRATE&

it for the sake of use and profit which is common to them

and all men. And hence they are very bad company, for

they can talk about nothing but the praises of wealth.

That is true, he said.

Yes, that is very true, but may I ask another question ? — The advan-
What do you consider to be the greatest blessing which you
have reaped from your wealth ?

One, he said, of which I could not expect easily to con- The fear of
vince others. For let me tell you, Socrates, that when a fhefch0*_nd
man thinks himself to be near death, fears and cares enter sciousness
into his mind which he never had before : the tales of a of sm be~

come more

world below and the punishment which is exacted there of vivid in old
deeds done here were once a laughing matter to him, but ase | and to
now he is tormented with the thought that they may be true : frees a man
either from the weakness of age, or because he is now drawing from many
nearer to that other place, he has a clearer view of these
things ; suspicions and alarms crowd thickly upon him, and
he begins to reflect and consider what wrongs he has done to
others. And when he finds that the sum of his transgres-
sions is great he will many a time like a child start up in his
sleep for fear, arid he is filled with dark forebodings. But
331 to him who is conscious of no sin, sweet hope, as Pindar Thead-
charmingly says, is the kind nurse of his age :

' Hope,' he says, ' cherishes the soul of him who lives in justice
and holiness, and is the nurse of his age and the companion
of his journey ;— hope which is mightiest to sway the restless soul
of man.'

How admirable are his words ! And the great blessing of
riches, I do not say to every man, but to a good man, is,
that he has had no occasion to deceive or to defraud others,
either intentionally or\mintentionally ; and when he departs to
the world below he is not in any apprehension about offerings
due to the gods or debts which he owes to men. Now to
this peace of mind the possession of wealth greatly contri-
butes; and therefore I say, that, setting one thing against
another, of the many advantages which wealth has to give,
to a man of sense this is in my opinion the greatest.

The first Definition of Justice

Republic

CEPHALUS,
SOCRATES,

POLEMAR-
CHUS.

Justice
to speak
truth and
pay your
debts.

This is the
definition
of Simon-
ides. But
you ought
not on all
occasions
to do
either.
What then
was his
meaning?

Well said, Cephalus, I replied ; but as concerning justice,
what is it? — to speak the truth and to pay your debts — no
more than this ? And even to this are there not exceptions ?
Suppose that a friend when in his right mind has deposited
arms with me and he asks for them when he is not in his
right mind, ought I to give them back to him ? No one would
say that I ought or that I should be right in doing so, any
more than they would say that I ought always to speak the
truth to one who is in his condition.

You are quite right, he replied.

But then, I said, speaking the truth and paying your debts
is not a correct definition of justice.

Quite correct, Socrates, if Simonides is to be believed,
said Polemarchus interposing.

I fear, said Cephalus, that I must go now, for I have to
look after the sacrifices, and I hand over the argument to
Polemarchus and the company.

Is not Polemarchus your heir ? I said.

To be sure, he answered, and went away laughing to the
sacrifices.

Tell me then, O thou heir of the argument, what did
Simonides say, and according to you truly say, about
justice ?

He said that the re-payment of a debt is just, and in saying
so he appears to me to be right.

I should be sorry to doubt the word of such a wise and in-
spired man, but his meaning, though probably clear to you,
is the reverse of clear to me. For he certainly does not
mean, as we were just now saying, that I ought to return a
deposit of arms or of anything else to one who asks for it
when he is not in his right senses ; and yet a deposit cannot 332
be denied to be a debt.

True.

Then when the person who asks me is not in his right
mind I am by no means to make the return ?

Certainly not.

When Simonides said that the repayment of a debt was
justice, he did not mean to include that case ?

Certainly not ; for he thinks that a friend ought always to
do good to a friend and never evil.

is examined and found wanting.

You mean that the return of a deposit of gold which is to Republic
the injury of the receiver, if the two parties are friends, is not L
the repayment of a debt, — that is what you would imagine
him to say ?

Yes.

And are enemies also to receive what we owe to them ?

To be sure, he said, they are to receive what we owe
them, and an enemy, as I take it, owes to an enemy that
which is due or proper to him — that is to say, evil.

Simonides, then, after the manner of poets, would seem to He may
have spoken darkly of the nature of justice ; for he really ^™ "^
meant to say that justice is the giving to each man what is justice gives
proper to him, and this he termed a debt. to frie.nds

That must have been his meaning, he said* good and

By heaven ! I replied ; and if we asked him what due or to enemies
proper thing is given by medicine, and to whom, what answer ^^ 1S
do you think that he would make to us ?

He would surely reply that medicine gives drugs and meat
and drink to human bodies.

And what due or proper thing is given by cookery, and to
what?

Seasoning to food.

And what is that which justice gives, and to whom ?

If, Socrates, we are to be guided at all by the analogy of
the preceding instances, then justice is the art which gives
good to friends and evil to enemies.

That is his meaning then ?

I think so.

And who is best able to do good to his friends and evil to niustra-
his enemies in time of sickness ?

The physician.

Or when they are on a voyage, amid the perils of the sea ?

The pilot.

And in what sort of actions or with a view to what result is
the just man most able to do harm to his enemy and good
to his friend ?

In going to war against the one anxd in making alliances
with the other.

But when a man is well, my dear Polemarchus, there is no
need of a physician ?

8 A further cross-examination.

Republic No.

And he who is not on a voyage has no need of a pilot ?

SOCRATES, N

POLEMAR-

CHUS. Then in time of peace justice will be of no use ?

I am very far from thinking so.

You think that justice may be of use in peace as well as 333
in war ?

Yes.

Like husbandry for the acquisition of corn ?

Yes.

Or like shoemaking for the acquisition of shoes, — that is
what you mean ?

Yes.

And what similar use or power of acquisition has justice in
time of peace ?
justice is In contracts, Socrates, justice is of use.

contracts ^n(* ^v contracts vou mean partnerships ?

Exactly.

But is the just man or the skilful player a more useful and
better partner at a game of draughts ?

The skilful player.

And in the laying of bricks and stones is the just man a
more useful or better partner than the builder ?

Quite the reverse.

Then in what sort of partnership is the just man a better
partner than the harp-player, as in playing the harp the harp-
player is certainly a better partner than the just man ?

In a money partnership.

Yes, Polemarchus, but surely not in the use of money ; for
you do not want a just man to be your counsellor in the pur-
chase or sale of a horse ; a man who is knowing about horses
would be better for that, would he not ?

Certainly.

And when you want to buy a ship, the shipwright or the
pilot would be better ?

True.

Then what is that joint use of silver or gold in which the
especially just man is to be preferred ?
keephi^oT When you want a deposit to be kept safely,
deposits. You mean when money is not wanted, but allowed to lie ?

Justice turns out to be a Thief. 9

Precisely. Republic

That is to say, justice is useful when money is useless ?

That is the inference. SOCRATES,

POLEMAR-

And when you want to keep a pruning-hook safe, then jus- c«us.
tice is useful to the individual and to the state ; but when you But not in
want to use it, then the art of the vine-dresser ? the use of

money;

Clearly. and if so,

And when you want to keep a shield or a lyre, and not to justice is

use them, you would say that justice is useful ; but when you ^

want to use them, then the art of the soldier or of the money or
musician? *«

Certainly. useless.

And so of all other things ; — justice is useful when they
are useless, and useless when they are useful ?

That is the inference.

Then justice is not good for much. But let us consider
this further point : Is not he who can best strike a blow in
a boxing match or in any kind of fighting best able to ward
off a blow?

Certainly.

And he who is most skilful in preventing or escaping1
from a disease is best able to create one ?

True?

And he is the best guard of a camp who is best able to A new
334 steal a march upon the enemy? ^™\ °*s

Certainly. not he who

Then he who is a good keeper of anything is also a good is best able

to do good
best able to

That, I suppose, is to be inferred. do evil?

Then if the just man is good at keeping money, he is
good at stealing it.

That is implied in the argument.

Then after all the just man has turned out to be a thief.
And this is a lesson which I suspect you must have learnt
out of Homer; for he, speaking of Autolycus, the maternal
grandfather of Odysseus, who is a favourite of his, affirms

that

He was excellent above all men in theft and perjury.

And so, you and Homer and Simonides are agreed that

1 Reading <f>v\&£a0Gcu KOI \a0fTv, ovroy, K.T.\.

10

More difficulties.

Republic
I.

SOCRATES,

POLEMAR-
CHUS.

Justice an
art of theft
to be prac-
tised for the
good of
friends and
the harm of
enemies.
But who are
friends and
enemies ?

Mistakes
will some-
times
happen.

Correction
of the defi-
nition.

justice is an art of theft ; to be practised however ' for the
good of friends and for the harm of enemies/ — that was
what you were saying ?

No, certainly not that, though I do not now know what I
did say ; but I still stand by the latter words.

Well, there is another question : By friends and enemies
do we mean those who are so really, or only in seeming ?

Surely, he said, a man may be expected to love those whom
he thinks good, and to hate those whom he thinks evil.

Yes, but do not persons often err about good and evil:
many who are not good seem to be so, and conversely ?

That is true.

Then to them the good will be enemies and the evil will
be their friends ?

True.

And in that case they will be right in doing good to the
evil and evil to the good ?

Clearly.

But the good are just and would not do an injustice ?

True.

Then according to your argument it is just to injure those
who do no wrong ?

Nay, Socrates ; the doctrine is immoral.

Then I suppose that we ought to do good to the just and
harm to the unjust?

I like that better.

But see the consequence : — Many a man who is ignorant of
human nature has friends who are bad friends, and in that
case he ought to do harm to them ; and he has good enemies
whom he ought to benefit ; but, if so, we shall be saying the
very opposite of that which we affirmed to be the meaning of
Simonides.

Very true, he said ; and I think that we had better correct
an error into which we seem to have fallen in the use of the
words ' friend ' and ' enemy.'

What was the error, Polemarchus ? I asked.

We assumed that he is a friend who seems to be or who
is thought good.

And how is the error to be corrected ?

We should rather say that he is a friend who is, as well as

A new colour given to the definition. 1 1

335 seems, good ; and that he who seems only, and is not good, Republic
only seems to be and is not a friend ; and of an enemy the

same may be said. SOCRATES,

? .POLEMAR-

You would argue that the good are our friends and the CHUS-

bad our enemies ? To aP-

pearance
we must

And instead of saying simply as we did at first, that it is addreaiity.

just to do good to our friends and harm to our enemies, we friend who

should further say: It is just to do good to our friends when 'is' as well

they are good and harm to our enemies when they are evil ? ^o^And

Yes, that appears to me to be the truth. we should

But ought the just to injure any one at all ? our^ooV0

Undoubtedly he ought to injure those who are both wicked friends and

and his enemies. harm to

When horses are injured, are they improved or deterio- enemies.
rated.

The latter. To harm

Deteriorated, that is to say, in the good qualities of horses, men is to

not Of dogs? Zm^and

Yes, of horses. to injure

And dogs are deteriorated in the good qualities of dogs, makethem

and not of horses ? unjust. But

And will not men who are injured be deteriorated in that injustice.
which is the proper virtue of man ?

Certainly.

And that human virtue is justice ?

To be sure.

Then men who are injured are of necessity made unjust?

That is the result.

But can the musician by his art make men unmusical ? niustra-

Certainly not. tions-

Or the horseman by his art make them bad horsemen ?

Impossible.

And can the just by justice make men unjust, or speaking
generally, can the good by virtue make them bad ?

Assuredly not.

Any more than heat can produce cold ?

It cannot.

Or drought moisture ?

12

Failure of the Definition.

Republic

SOCRATES,
POLEMAR-

CHUS,

THRASYMA-
CHUS.

The saying
however
explained
is not to be
attributed
to any good
or wise
roan.

The bru-
tality of
Thrasyma-
chus.

Clearly not.

Nor can the good harm any one ?

Impossible.

And the just is the good ?

Certainly.

Then to injure a friend or any one else is not the act of a
just man, but of the opposite, who is the unjust ?

I think that what you say is quite true, Socrates.

Then if a man says that justice consists in the repayment
of debts, and that good is the debt which a just man owes to
his friends, and evil the debt which he owes to his enemies,
— to say this is not wise ; for it is not true, if, as has been
clearly shown, the injuring of another can be in no case just.

I agree with you, said Polemarchus.

Then you and I are prepared to take up arms against any
one who attributes such a saying to Simonides or Bias or
Pittacus, or any other wise man or seer ?

I am quite ready to do battle at your side, he said.

Shall I tell you whose I believe the saying to be ? 336

Whose?

I believe that Periander or Perdiccas or Xerxes or Is-
menias the Theban, or some other rich and mighty man,
who had a great opinion of his own power, was the first to
say that justice is 'doing good to your friends and harm to
your enemies.'

Most true, he said.

Yes, I said ; but if this definition of justice also breaks
down, what other can be offered ?

Several times in the course of the discussion Thrasymachus
had made an attempt to get the argument into his own hands,
and had been put down by the rest of the company, who
wanted to hear the end. But when Polemarchus and I
had done speaking and there was a pause, he could no
longer hold his peace ; and, gathering himself up, he came
at us like a wild beast, seeking to devour us. We were
quite panic-stricken at the sight of him.

He roared out to the whole company : What folly, Socrates,
has taken possession of you all ? And why, sillybillies, do
you knock under to one another ? I say that if you want
really to know what justice is, you should not only ask but

The Irony of Socrates. 13

answer, and you should not seek honour to yourself from Republic
the refutation of an opponent, but have your own answer ;
for there is many a one who can ask and cannot answer.
And now I will not have you say that justice is duty or ad-
vantage or profit or gain or interest, for this sort of nonsense
will not do for me ; I must have clearness and accuracy.

I was panic-stricken at his words, and could not look at
him without trembling. Indeed I believe that if I had not
fixed my eye upon him, I should have been struck dumb:
but when I saw his fury rising, I looked at him first, and was
therefore able to reply to him.

Thrasymachus, I said, with a quiver, don't be hard upon us.
Polemarchus and I may have been guilty of a little mistake
in the argument, but I can assure you that the error was not
intentional. If we were seeking for a piece of gold, you
would not imagine that we were ' knocking under to one
another/ and so losing our chance of finding it. And why,
when we are seeking for justice, a thing more precious than
many pieces of gold, do you say that we are weakly yielding
to one another and not doing our utmost to get at the truth ?
Nay, my good friend, we are most willing and anxious to do
so, but the fact is that we cannot. And if so, you people who
know all things should pity us and not be angry with us.
337 How characteristic of Socrates ! he replied, with a bitter
laugh ; — that's your ironical style ! Did I not foresee — have
I not already told you, that whatever he was asked he would
refuse to answer, and try irony or any other shuffle, in order
that he might avoid answering ?

You are a philosopher, Thrasymachus, I replied, and well Socrates
know that if you ask a person what numbers make up twelve, a^answer
taking care to prohibit him whom you ask from answering twice if all true

six, or three times four, or six times two, or four times three, answe-rs ,are

. excluded.

' for this sort of nonsense will not do for me/ — then obviously,

if that is your way of putting the question, no one can answer
you. But suppose that he were to retort, 'Thrasymachus, Thrasyma-
what do you mean? If one of these numbers which you saUed^with
interdict be the true answer to the question, am I falsely his own
to say some other number which is not the right one ?— is weaP°ns-
that your meaning ? ' — How would you answer him ?
Just as if the two cases were at all alike ! he said.

The Irony of Socrates is

Republic

SOCRATES,
THRASYMA-

CHUS,

GLAUCON.

The So-
phist de-
mands pay-
ment for
his instruc-
tions. The
company
are very
willing to
contribute.

Socrates
knows little
or nothing :
how can he
answer ?
And he is
deterred by
the inter-
dict of
Thrasyma-
chus.

Why should they not be ? I replied ; and even if they
are not, but only appear to be so to the person who is asked,
ought he not to say what he thinks, whether you and I forbid
him or not ?

I presume then that you are going to make one of the
interdicted answers ?

I dare say that I may, notwithstanding the danger, if upon
reflection I approve of any of them.

But what if I give you an answer about justice other and
better, he said, than any of these ? What do you deserve to
have done to you ?

Done to me ! — as becomes the ignorant, I must learn from
the wise — that is what I deserve to have done to me.

What, and no payment ! a pleasant notion !

I will pay when I have the money, I replied.

But you have, Socrates, said Glaucon : and you, Thrasyma-
chus, need be under no anxiety about money, for we will all
make a contribution for Socrates.

Yes, he replied, and then Socrates will do as he always
does — refuse to answer himself, but take and pull to pieces
the answer of some one else.

Why, my good friend, I said, how can any one answer who
knows, and says that he knows, just nothing ; and who, even
if he has some faint notions of his own, is told by a man
of authority not to utter them ? The natural thing is, that
the speaker should be some one like yourself who pro- 338
fesses to know and can tell what he knows. Will you then
kindly answer, for the edification of the company and of
myself ?

Glaucon and the rest of the company joined in my request,
and Thrasymachus, as any one might see, was in reality eager
to speak ; for he thought that he had an excellent answer, and
would distinguish himself. But at first he affected to insist
on my answering ; at length he consented to begin. Behold,
he said, the wisdom of Socrates ; he refuses to teach himself)
and goes about learning of others, to -whom he never even
says Thank you.

That I learn of others, I replied, is quite true ; but that
I am ungrateful I wholly deny. Money I have none, and
therefore I pay in praise, which is all I have ; and how ready

too much for Thrasymachus. 1 5

I am to praise any one who appears to me to speak well you Republic
will very soon find out when you answer ; for I expect that
you will answer well.

Listen, then, he said ; I proclaim that justice is nothing

else than the interest of the stronger. And now why do you The dffini'

_ _ _ tion of

not praise me ? But of course you won t. Thrasy-

Let me first understand you, I replied. Justice, as you say, machus:
is the interest of the stronger. What, Thrasymachus, is the t^nterest
meaning of this? You cannot mean to say that because of the
Polydamas, the pancratiast, is stronger than we are, and JJJJCT?61"
finds the eating of beef conducive to his bodily strength, that
to eat beef is therefore equally for our good who are weaker
than he is, and right and just for us ?

That's abominable of you, Socrates ; you take the words in
the sense which is most damaging to the argument.

Not at all, my good sir, I said ; I am trying to understand
them ; and I wish that you would be a little clearer.

Well, he said, have you never heard that forms of govern-
ment differ ; there are tyrannies, and there are democracies,
and there are aristocracies ?

Yes, I know.

And the government is the ruling power in each state ?

Certainly.

And the different forms of government make laws demo- Socrates
cratical, aristocratical, tyrannical, with a view to their several ^J^18
interests ; and these laws, which are made by them for their machus to
own interests, are the justice which they deliver to their explain his
subjects, and him who transgresses them they punish as a
breaker of the law, and unjust. And that is what I mean
when I say that in all states there is the same principle of
justice, which is the interest of the government ; and as the
339 government must be supposed to have power, the only
reasonable conclusion is, that everywhere there is one prin-
ciple of justice, which is the interest of the stronger.

Now I understand you, I said ; and whether you are right
or not I will try to discover. But let me remark, that in
defining justice you have yourself used the word 'interest*
which you forbade me to use. It is true, however, that
in your definition the words ' of the stronger ' are added.

A small addition, you must allow, he said.

i6

Are Words always to be used

Republic
I.

SOCRATES,
THRASYMA-
CHUS,

POLEMAR-
CHUS.

He is dis-
satisfied
with the
expla-
nation ; for
rulers may

And then
the justice
which
makes a
mistake
will turn
out to be
the reverse
of the in-
terest of the
stronger.

Great or small, never mind about that: we must first
enquire whether what you are saying is the truth. Now
we are both agreed that justice is interest of some sort, but
you go on to say ' of the stronger J ; about this addition I am
not so sure, and must therefore consider further.

Proceed.

I will ; and first tell me, Do you admit that it is just for
subjects to obey their rulers ?

I do.

But are the rulers of states absolutely infallible, or are they
sometimes liable to err ?

To be sure, he replied, they are liable to err.

Then in making their laws they may sometimes make
them rightly, and sometimes not ?

True.

When they make them rightly, they make them agreeably
to their interest ; when they are mistaken, contrary to their
interest ; you admit that ?

Yes.

And the laws which they make must be obeyed by their
subjects, — and that is what you call justice ?

Doubtless.

Then justice, according to your argument, is not only
obedience to the interest of the stronger but the reverse ?

What is that you are saying ? he asked.

I am only repeating what you are saying, I believe. But
let us consider : Have we not admitted that the rulers may
be mistaken about their own interest in what they command,
and also that to obey them is justice? Has not that been
admitted ?

Yes.

Then you must also have acknowledged justice not to be for
the interest of the stronger, when the rulers unintentionally
command things to be done which are to their own injury.
For if, as you say, justice is the obedience which the subject
renders to their commands, in that case, O wisest of men, is
there any escape from the conclusion that the weaker are
commanded to do, not what is for the interest, but what is for
the injury of the stronger?

Nothing can be clearer, Socrates, said Polemarchus.

in their strictest sense?

340 Yes, said Cleitophon, interposing, if you are allowed to be
his witness.

But there is no need of any witness, said Polemarchus,
for Thrasymachus himself acknowledges that rulers may
sometimes command what is not for their own interest, and
that for subjects to obey them is justice.

Yes, Polemarchus, — Thrasymachus said that for subjects
to do what was commanded by their rulers is just.

Yes, Cleitophon, but he also said that justice is the
interest of the stronger, and, while admitting both these
propositions, he further acknowledged that the stronger may
command the weaker who are his subjects to do what is not
for his own interest ; whence follows that justice is the injury
quite as much as the interest of the stronger.

But, said Cleitophon, he meant by the interest of the
stronger what the stronger thought to be his interest, — this
was what the weaker had to do ; and this was affirmed by
him to be justice.

Those were not his words, rejoined Polemarchus.

Never mind, I replied, if he now says that they are, let us
accept his statement. Tell me, Thrasymachus, I said, did
you mean by justice what the stronger thought to be his
interest, whether really so or not ?

Certainly not, he said. Do you suppose that I call him
who is mistaken the stronger at the time when he is
mistaken ?

Yes, I said, my impression was that you did so, when you
admitted that the ruler was not infallible but might be some-
times mistaken.

You argue like an informer, Socrates. Do you mean, for
example, that he who is mistaken about the sick is a phy-
sician in that he is mistaken ? or that he who errs in
arithmetic or grammar is an arithmetician or grammarian
at the time when he is making the mistake, in respect of the
mistake? True, we say that the physician or arithmetician
or grammarian has made a mistake, but this is only a way of
speaking; for the fact is that neither the grammarian nor
any other person of skill ever makes a mistake in so far as
he is what his name implies ; they none of them err unless
their skill fails them, and then they cease to be skilled artists.

c

Republic

SOCRATES,
CLEITOPHON,
POLEMAR-
CHUS,

THRASYMA-
CHUS.

Cleitophon
tries to
make a
way of
escape for
Thrasy-
machus by
inserting
the words
' thought
to be.'

This eva-
sion is re-
pudiated
by Thra-
symachus ;

who adopts
another
line of
defence :
' No artist
or ruler is
ever mis-
taken qud
artist or
ruler.'

i8

The argument with Thrasymachus

Republic

SOCRATES,
THRASYMA-
CHUS.

The essen-
tial mean-
ing of
words dis-
tinguished
from their
attributes.

No artist or sage or ruler errs at the time when he is what
his name implies ; though he is commonly said to err, and I
adopted the common mode of speaking. But to be perfectly
accurate, since you are such a lover of accuracy, we should say
that the ruler, in so far as he is a ruler, is unerring, and,
being unerring, always commands that which is for his own 34 1
interest; and the subject is required to execute his com-
mands; and therefore, as I said at first and now repeat,
justice is the interest of the stronger.

Indeed, Thrasymachus, and do I really appear to you to
argue like an informer ?

Certainly, he replied.

And do you suppose that I ask these questions with any
design of injuring you in the argument ?

Nay, he replied, ' suppose ' is not the word — I know it ; but
you will be found out, and by sheer force of argument you
will never prevail.

I shall not make the attempt, my dear nian ; but to avoid
any misunderstanding occurring between us in future, let me
ask, in what sense do you speak of a ruler or stronger whose
interest, as you were saying, he being the superior, it is just
that the inferior should execute — is he a ruler in the popular
or in the strict sense of the term ?

In the strictest of all senses, he said. And now cheat and
play the informer if you can ; I ask no quarter at your hands.
But you never will be able, never.

And do you imagine, I said, that I am such a madman as
to try and cheat Thrasymachus? I might as well shave
a lion.

Why, he said, you made the attempt a minute ago, and you
failed.

Enough, I said, of these civilities. It will be better that I
should ask you a question : Is the physician, taken in that
strict sense of which you are speaking, a healer of the sick
or a maker of money? And remember that I am now
speaking of the true physician.

A healer of the sick, he replied.

And the pilot — that is to say, the true pilot — is he a captain
of sailors or a mere sailor ?

A captain of sailors.

is drawing to a conclusion. 19

The circumstance that he sails in the ship is not to be Republic
taken into account ; neither is he to be called a sailor ; the

name pilot by which he is distinguished has nothing to do
with sailing, but is significant of his skill and of his authority
over the sailors.

Very true, he said.

Now, I said, every art has an interest ?

Certainly.

For which the art has to consider and provide ?

Yes, that is the aim of art.

And the interest of any art is the perfection of it — this and
nothing else?

What do you mean ?

I mean what I may illustrate negatively by the example of
the body. Suppose you were to ask me whether the body is
self-sufficing or has wants, I should reply : Certainly the body
has wants ; for the body may be ill and require to be cured,
and has therefor^ interests to which the art of medicine
ministers ; and this is the origin and intention of medicine,
as you will acknowledge. Am I not right ?
342 Quite right, he replied.

But is the art of medicine or any other art faulty or Art has no
deficient in any quality in the same way that the eye may be ^J^be
deficient in sight or the ear fail of hearing, and therefore corrected,
requires another art to provide for the interests of seeing j^*6^.
and hearing — has art in itself, I say, any similar . liability to traneous
fault or defect, and does every art require another supple- mterest-
mentary art to provide for its interests, and that another and
another without end ? Or have the arts to look only after
their own interests ? Or have they no need either of them-
selves or of another ? — having no faults or defects, they have
no need to correct them, either by the exercise of their own
art or of any other ; they have only to consider the interest
of their subject-matter. For every art remains pure and
faultless while remaining true — that is to say, while perfect
and unimpaired. Take the words in your precise sense, and
tell me whether I am not right.

Yes, clearly.

Then medicine does not consider the interest of medicine, lUustra-
but the interest of the body ?

C 2

20

When he suddenly creates a diversion.

Republic

SOCRATES,
THRASVMA-

CHUS.

The dis-
interested-
ness of
rulers.

The impu-
dence of
Thrasy-
machus.

True, he said.

Nor does the art of horsemanship consider the interests of
the art of horsemanship, but the interests of the horse ;
neither do any other arts care for themselves, for they have
no needs ; they care only for that which is the subject of
their art ?

True, he said.

But surely, Thrasymachus, the arts are the superiors and
rulers of their own subjects?

To this he assented with a good deal of reluctance.

Then, I said, no science or art considers or enjoins the
interest of the stronger or superior, but only the interest
of the subject and weaker ?

He made an attempt to contest this proposition also, but
finally acquiesced.

Then, I continued, no physician, in so far as he is a
physician, considers his own good in what he prescribes, but
the good of his patient ; for the true physician is also a ruler
having the human body as a subject, and is not a mere
money-maker ; that has been admitted ?

Yes.

And the pilot likewise, in the strict sense of the term, is a
ruler of sailors and not a mere sailor ?

That has been admitted.

And such a pilot and ruler will provide and prescribe for
the interest of the sailor who is under him, and not for
his own or the ruler's interest ?

He gave a reluctant ' Yes.'

Then, I said, Thrasymachus, there is no one in any rule
who, in so far as he is a ruler, considers or enjoins what is
for his own interest, but always what is for the interest of his
subject or suitable to his art ; to that he looks, and that alone
he considers in everything which he says and does.

When we had got to this point in the argument, and every 343
one saw that the definition of justice had been completely
upset, Thrasymachus, instead of replying to me, said : Tell
me, Socrates, have you got a nurse ?

Why do you ask such a question, I said, when you ought
rather to be answering ?

Because she leaves you to snivel, and never wipes your

Instead of answering questions he makes a speech. 21

nose : she has not even taught you to know the shepherd Republic
from the sheep.

What makes you say that ? I replied.
Because you fancy that the shepherd or neatherd fattens
or tends the sheep or oxen with a view to their own good Thrasyma-

,_ . ° chus dilates

and not to the good of himself or his master ; and you upon the
further imagine that the rulers of states, if they are true advantages
rulers, never think of their subjects as sheep, and that they
are not studying their own advantage day and night. Oh,
no ; and so entirely astray are you in your ideas about
the just and unjust as not even to know that justice and the
just are in reality another's good ; that is to say, the interest
of the ruler and stronger, and the loss of the subject and
servant ; and injustice the opposite ; for the unjust is lord
over the truly simple and just: he is the stronger, and
his subjects do what is for his interest, and minister to his
happiness, which is very far from being their own. Consider
further, most foolish Socrates, that the just is always a loser
in comparison with the unjust. First of all, in private
contracts : wherever the unjust is the partner of the just
you will find that, when the partnership is dissolved, the
unjust man has always more and the just less. Secondly,
in their dealings with the State : when there is an income-tax,
the just man will pay more and the unjust less on the same
amount of income ; and when there is anything to be received
the one gains nothing and the other much. Observe also especially
what happens when they take an office ; there is the just man ^j1^^'
neglecting his affairs and perhaps suffering other losses, and great scale.
getting nothing out of the public, because he is just ; more-
over he is hated by his friends and acquaintance for refusing
to serve them in unlawful ways. But all this is reversed
in the case of the unjust man. I am speaking, as before, of
344 injustice on a large scale in which the advantage of the unjust
is most apparent ; and my meaning will be most clearly seen
if we turn to that highest form of injustice in which the
criminal is the happiest of men, and the sufferers or those
who refuse to do injustice are the most miserable — that is to Tyranny.
say tyranny, which by fraud and force takes away the pro-
perty of others, not little by little but wholesale ; compre-
hending in one, things sacred as well as profane, private

22

Thrasymachus in the hands of Socrates.

Republic

SOCRATES,
CHUS. '

Thrasyma-

speech
wants to

run away,

but is de-
tained by

the com-

pany.

and public ; for which acts of wrong, if he were detected
perpetrating any one of them singly, he would be punished
ancj incur great disgrace — they who do such wrong in par-
ticular cases are called robbers of temples, and man-stealers
and burglars and swindlers and thieves. But when a man
besides taking away the money of the citizens has made
slaves of them, then, instead of these names of reproach, he
is termed happy and blessed, not only by the citizens but by
all who hear of his having achieved the consummation of
injustice. For mankind censure injustice, fearing that they
may be the victims of it and not because they shrink from
committing it. And thus, as I have shown, Socrates, in-
justice, when on a sufficient scale, has more strength and
freedom and mastery than justice ; and, as I said at first,
justice is the interest of the stronger, whereas injustice is
a man's own profit and interest.

Thrasymachus, when he had thus spoken, having, like a
bath-man, deluged our ears with his words, had a mind to go
away. But the company would not let him; they insisted
tnat ne snouid remain and defend his position ; and I myself
added my own humble request that he would not leave us.
Thrasymachus, I said to him, excellent man, how suggestive

.

are your remarks ! And are you going to run away before
you have fairly taught or learned whether they are true or
not ? Is the attempt to determine the way of man's life so
small a matter in your eyes — to determine how life may be
passed by each one of us to the greatest advantage ?

And do I differ from you, he said, as to the importance of
the enquiry ?

You appear rather, I replied, to have no care or thought
about us, Thrasymachus — whether we live better or worse
from not knowing what you say you know, is to you a matter
of indifference. Prithee, friend, do not keep your knowledge 345
to yourself; we are a large party; and any benefit which you
confer upon us will be amply rewarded. For my own part I
openly declare that I am not convinced, and that I do not
believe injustice to be more gainful than justice, even if un-
controlled and allowed to have free play. For, granting that
there may be an unjust man who is able to commit injustice
either by fraud or force, still this does not convince me of the

The art of payment. 23

superior advantage of injustice, and there may be others who Republic
are in the same predicament with myself. Perhaps we may L
be wrong ; if so, you in your wisdom should convince us that ^^1
we are mistaken in preferring justice to injustice. CHUS.

And how am I to convince you, he said, if you are not The swag-
already convinced by what I have just said ; what more can
I do for you ? Would you have me put the proof bodily into chus.
your souls ?

Heaven forbid ! I said ; I would only ask you to be con-
sistent ; or, if you change, change openly and let there be no
deception. For I must remark, Thrasymachus, if you will
recall what was previously said, that although you began by
defining the true physician in an exact sense, you did not
observe a like exactness when speaking of the shepherd ;
you thought that the shepherd as a shepherd tends the sheep
not with a view to their own good, but like a mere diner or
banquetter with a view to the pleasures of the table ; or,
again, as a trader for sale in the market, and not as a shep-
herd. Yet surely the art of the shepherd is concerned only
with the good of his subjects ; he has only to provide the
best for them, since the perfection of the art is already en-
sured whenever all the requirements of it are satisfied. And
that was what I was saying just now about the ruler. I con-
ceived that the art of the ruler, considered as ruler, whether
in a state or in private life, could only regard the good of his
flock or subjects ; whereas you seem to think that the rulers
in states, that is to say, the true rulers, like being in authority.

Think ! Nay, I am sure of it.

Then why in the case of lesser offices do men never take

them willingly without payment, unless under the idea that

346 they govern for the advantage not of themselves but of

others ? Let me ask you a question : Are not the several The arts
arts different, by reason of their each having a separate
function ? And, my dear illustrious friend, do say what you tions and
think, that we may make a little progress. bTcon-*

Yes, that is the difference, he replied. founded

And each art gives us a particular good and not merely a JJJJ^f^L
general one — medicine, for example, gives us health ; navi- ment which
gation, safety at sea, and so on ? * °™

Yes, he said.

Republic
I.

SOCRATES,
THRASYMA-

CHUS.

The true
ruler or
artist seeks,
not his own
advantage,
but the

Governments rule for their subjects good,

And the art of payment has the special function of giving
pay : but we do not confuse this with other arts, any more
than the art of the pilot is to be confused with the art of
medicine, because the health of the pilot may be improved by
a sea voyage. You would not be inclined to say, would you,
that navigation is the art of medicine, at least if we are to
adopt your exact use of language ?

Certainly not.

Or because a man is in good health when he receives pay
you would not say that the art of payment is medicine ?

I should not.

Nor would you say that medicine is the art of receiving
pay because a man takes fees when he is engaged in healing ?

Certainly not.

And we have admitted, I said, that the good of each art is
specially confined to the art ?

Yes.

Then, if there be any good which all artists have in com-
mon, that is to be attributed to something of which they all
have the common use ?

True, he replied.

And when the artist is benefited by receiving pay the ad-
vantage is gained by an additional use of the art of pay,
which is not the art professed by him ?

He gave a reluctant assent to this.

Then the pay is not derived by the several artists from
their respective arts. But the truth is, that while the art of
medicine gives health, and the art of the builder builds a
house, another art attends them which is the art of pay.
The various arts may be doing their own business and
benefiting that over which they preside, but would the artist
receive any benefit from his art unless he were paid as well ?

I suppose not.

But does he therefore confer no benefit when he works for
nothing ?

Certainly, he confers a benefit.

Then now, Thrasymachus, there is no longer any doubt
that neither arts nor governments provide for their own
interests ; but, as we were before saying, they rule and pro-
vide for the interests of their subjects who are the weaker

and must therefore be paid. 25

and not the stronger — to their good they attend and not to Republic
the good of the superior. And this is the reason, my dear
Thrasymachus, why, as I was just now saying, no one is
willing to govern ; because no one likes to take in hand the perfection
reformation of evils which are not his concern without re- of his art;
347 muneration. For, in the execution of his work, and in ^ j^ere
giving his orders to another, the true artist does not regard must be
his own interest, but always that of his subjects ; and there- paid'
fore in order that rulers may be willing to rule, they must be
paid in one of three modes of payment, money, or honour, or
a penalty for refusing.

What do you mean, Socrates ? said Glaucon. The first two Three
modes of payment are intelligible enough, but what the penalty n^°^s of
is I do not understand, or how a penalty can be a payment, rulers,

You mean that you do not understand the nature of this ™^J
payment which to the best men is the great inducement to and a
rule ? Of course you know that ambition and avarice are
held to be, as indeed they are, a disgrace ? rule.

Very true.

And for this reason, I said, money and honour have no
attraction for them; good men do not wish to be openly
demanding payment for governing and so to get the name of
hirelings, nor by secretly helping themselves out of the
public revenues to get the name of thieves. And not being
ambitious they do not care about honour. Wherefore neces-
sity must be laid upon them, and they must be induced to
serve from the fear of punishment. And this, as I imagine, The penai-
is the reason why the forwardness to take office, instead of Jviiof be-
waiting to be compelled, has been deemed dishonourable, ing ruled
Now the worst part of the punishment is that he who refuses fe^or.in
to rule is liable to be ruled by one who is worse than himself.
And the fear of this, as I conceive, induces the good to take
office, not because they would, but because they cannot help
— not under the idea that they are going to have any benefit
or enjoyment themselves, but as a necessity, and because Inadt
they are not able to commit the task of ruling to any one composed
who is better than themselves, or indeed as good. For there wholly of

. . good men

is reason to think that if a city were composed entirely of there would
good men, then to avoid office would be as much an object be a great
of contention as to obtain office is at present; then we should ness to rule.

26

Thrasymachus is put to the question.

Republic

I.

SOCRATES,
GLAUCON,
THRASYMA-
CHUS.

Thrasyma-
chus main-
tains that
the life of
the unjust
is better
than the
life of the
just.

A paradox
still more
extreme,

have plain proof that the true ruler is not meant by nature
to regard his own interest, but that of his subjects; and
every one who knew this would choose rather to receive a
benefit from another than to have the trouble of conferring
one. So far am I from agreeing with Thrasymachus that
justice is the interest of the stronger. This latter question
need not be further discussed at present ; but when Thrasy-
machus says that the life of the unjust is more advantageous
than that of the just, his new statement appears to me to be
of a far more serious character. Which of us has spoken
truly ? And which sort of life, Glaucon, do you prefer ?

I for my part deem the life of the just to be the more
advantageous, he answered.

Did you hear all the advantages of the unjust which 348
Thrasymachus was rehearsing?

Yes, I heard him, he replied, but he has not convinced me.

Then shall we try to find some way of convincing him, if
we can, that he is saying what is not true ?

Most certainly, he replied.

If, I said, he makes a set speech and we make another
recounting all the advantages of being just, and he answers
and we rejoin, there must be a numbering and measuring of
the goods which are claimed on either side, and in the
end we shall want judges to decide ; but if we proceed in
our enquiry as we lately did, by making admissions to one
another, we shall unite the offices of judge and advocate
in our own persons.

Very good, he said.

And which method do I understand you to prefer ? I said.

That which you propose.

Well, then, Thrasymachus, I said, suppose you begin
at the beginning and answer me. You say that perfect
injustice is more gainful than perfect justice ?

Yes, that is what I say, and I have given you my reasons.

And what is your view about them ? Would you call one
of them virtue and the other vice ?

Certainly.

I suppose that you would call justice virtue and injustice vice?

What a charming notion ! So likely too, seeing that I
affirm injustice to be profitable and justice not.

The just aims at moderation, not at excess. 27

What else then would you say ? Republic

The opposite, he replied.

And would you call justice vice? T^sm*.

No, I would rather say sublime simplicity. CHUS-

Then would you call injustice malignity? thatinjus-

No ; I would rather say discretion. ^u^

And do the unjust appear to you to be wise and good ?

Yes, he said ; at any rate those of them who are able to be
perfectly unjust, and who have the power of subduing states
and nations ; but perhaps you imagine me to be talking
of cutpurses. Even this profession if undetected has ad-
vantages, though they are not to be compared with those of
which I was just now speaking.

I do not think that I misapprehend your meaning, Thrasy-
machus, I replied ; but still I cannot hear without amazement
that you class injustice with wisdom and virtue, and justice
with the opposite.

Certainly, I do so class them.

Now, I said, you are on more substantial and almost
unanswerable ground ; for if the injustice which you were
maintaining to be profitable had been admitted by you as by
others to be vice and deformity, an answer might have been
given to you on received principles ; but now I perceive that
349 you will call injustice honourable and strong, and to the
unjust you will attribute all the qualities which were attributed
by us before to the just, seeing that you do not hesitate to
rank injustice with wisdom and virtue.

You have guessed most infallibly, he replied.

Then I certainly ought not to shrink from going through
with the argument so long as I have reason to think that you,
Thrasymachus, are speaking your real mind ; for I do believe
that you are now in earnest and are not amusing yourself at
our expense.

I may be in earnest or not, but what is that to you ? — to
refute the argument is your business.

Very true, I said ; that is what I have to do : But will you refuted by
be so good as answer yet one more question? Does the *e analogy
just man try to gain any advantage over the just ?

Far otherwise; if he did he would not be the simple
amusing creature which he is.

2.8

No art aims at excess.

Republic
L

SOCRATES,
THRASYMA-
CHUS,

The just
tries to ob-
tain an ad-
vantage
over the
unjust, but
not over
the just ;
the unjust
over both
just and
unjust.

Illustra-
tions.

And would he try to go beyond just action ?

He would not.

And how would he regard the attempt to gain an advantage
over the unjust ; would that be considered by him as just or
unjust ?

He would think it just, and would try to gain the advantage ;
but he would not be able.

Whether he would or would not be able, I said, is not
to the point. My question is only whether the just man,
while refusing to have more than another just man, would
wish and claim to have more than the unjust?

Yes, he would.

And what of the unjust — does he claim to have more than
the just man and to do more than is just ?

Of course, he said, for he claims to have more than all men.

And the unjust man will strive and struggle to obtain more
than the unjust man or action, in order that he may have
more than all ?

True.

We may put the matter thus, I said — the just does not
desire more than his like but more than his unlike, whereas
the unjust desires more than both his like and his unlike ?

Nothing, he said, can be better than that statement.

And the unjust is good and wise, and the just is neither?

Good again, he said.

And is not the unjust like the wise and good and the
just unlike them ?

Of course, he said, he who is of a certain nature, is like
those who are of a certain nature ; he who is not, not.

Each of them, I said, is such as his like is ?

Certainly, he replied.

Very good, Thrasymachus, I said ; and now to take the
case of the arts : you would admit that one man is a musician
and another not a musician ?

Yes.

And which is wise and which is foolish ?

Clearly the musician is wise, and he who is not a musician
is foolish.

And he is good in as far as he is wise, and bad in as far as
he is foolish ?

The final overthrow of Thrasymachus. 29

Yes. Republic

And you would say the same sort of thing of the physician ?

VPS SOCRATES,

THRASYMA-

And do you think, my excellent friend, that a musician c»us.
when he adjusts the lyre would desire or claim to exceed or
go beyond a musician in the tightening and loosening the
strings ?

I do not think that he would.

But he would claim to exceed the non-musician ?

Of course.

350 And what would you say of the physician ? In prescribing
meats and drinks would he wish to go beyond another
physician or beyond the practice of medicine ?

He would not.

But he would wish to go beyond the non-physician ?

Yes.

And about knowledge and ignorance in general; see The artist
whether you think that any man who has knowledge ever J^j^
would wish to have the choice of saying or doing more than limits of
another man who has knowledge. Would he not rather say his art :
or do the same as his like in the same case ?

That, I suppose, can hardly be denied.

And what of the ignorant ? would he not desire to have
more than either the knowing or the ignorant ?

I dare say.

And the knowing is wise ?

Yes.

And the wise is good ?

True.

Then the wise and good will not desire to gain more than
his like, but more than his unlike and opposite ?

I suppose so.

Whereas the bad and ignorant will desire to gain more
than both ?

Yes.

But did we not say, Thrasymachus, that the unjust goes
beyond both his like and unlike? Were not these your words?

They were.

And you also said that the just will not go beyond his
like but his unlike ? man does

30 Thrasymachus and Socrates.

Republic Yes.

L Then the just is like the wise and good, and the unjust like

SOCRATES, tne evji an(j ignorant ?

THRASYMA-

CHUS. That is the inference,

not exceed ^nd eacn of them is such as his like is?

the limits of

other just That was admitted.

men. Then the just has turned out to be wise and good and the

unjust evil and ignorant.

Thrasyma- Thrasymachus made all these admissions, not fluently, as
spiring^and * repeat them, but with extreme reluctance; it was a hot
even blush- summer's day, and the perspiration poured from him in
torrents; and then I saw what I had never seen before,
Thrasymachus blushing. As we were now agreed that
justice was virtue and wisdom, and injustice vice and ignor-
ance, I proceeded to another point :

Well, I said, Thrasymachus, that matter is now settled;
but were we not also saying that injustice had strength;
do you remember ?

Yes, I remember, he said, but do not suppose that I
approve of what you are saying or have no answer; if
however I were to answer, you would be quite certain to
accuse me of haranguing ; therefore either permit me to have
my say out, or if you would rather ask, do so, and I will
answer 'Very good/ as they say to story-telling old women,
and will nod 'Yes* arid 'No/

Certainly not, I said, if contrary to your real opinion.
Yes, he said, I will, to please you, since you will not let
me speak. What else would you have ?

Nothing in the world, I said; and if you are so disposed I
will ask and you shall answer.
Proceed.

Then I will repeat the question which I asked before, in
order that our examination of the relative nature of justice 351
and injustice may be carried on regularly. A statement was
made that injustice is stronger and more powerful than
justice, but now justice, having been identified with wisdom
and virtue, is easily shown to be stronger than injustice, if
injustice is ignorance; this can no longer be questioned by
any one. But I want to view the matter, Thrasymachus, in
a different way: You would not deny that a state may be

Injustice a principle of weakness and disunion. 31

unjust and may be unjustly attempting to enslave other Republic
states, or may have already enslaved them, and may be

holding many of them in subjection ?

True, he replied ; and I will add that the best and most
perfectly unjust state will be most likely to do so.

I know, I said, that such was your position ; but what I
would further consider is, whether this power which is
possessed by the superior state can exist or be exercised
without justice or only with justice.

If you are right in your view, and justice is wisdom, then At this
only with justice ; but if I am right, then without justice. tenT^of

I am delighted, Thrasymachus, to see you not only Thrasyma-
nodding assent and dissent, but making answers which are toTmbroveS
quite excellent. Cp. 5. 450

That is out of civility to you, he replied. A> 6' 498 C'

You are very kind, I said ; and would you have the good-
ness also to inform me, whether you think that a state, or an
army, or a band of robbers and thieves, or any other gang of
evil-doers could act at all if they injured one another ?

No indeed, he said, they could not.

But if they abstained from injuring one another, then they
might act together better ?

Yes.

And this is because injustice creates divisions and hatreds
and fighting, and justice imparts harmony and friendship ; is
not that true, Thrasymachus ?

I agree, he said, because I do not wish to quarrel with you. Perfect in-

How good of you, I said ; but I should like to know also Aether in
whether injustice, having this tendency to arouse hatred, state or in-
wherever existing, among slaves or among freemen, will J^J^!
not make them hate one another and set them at variance tiveto
and render them incapable of common action ?

Certainly.

And even if injustice be found in two only, will they not
quarrel and fight, and become enemies to one another and to
the just?

They will.

And suppose injustice abiding in a single person, would
your wisdom say that she loses or that she retains her
natural power ?

The suicidal character of injustice.

Republic

SOCRATES,
THRASYMA-
CHUS.

Recapitu-
lation.

Let us assume that she retains her power.

Yet is not the power which injustice exercises of such a
nature that wherever she. takes up her abode, whether in a
city, in an army, in a family, or in any other body, that body
is, to begin with, rendered incapable of united action by 352
reason of sedition and distraction ; and does it not become
its own enemy and at variance with all that opposes it, and
with the just ? Is not this the case ?

Yes, certainly.

And is not injustice equally fatal when existing in a single
person ; in the first place rendering him incapable of action
because he is not at unity with himself, and in the second
place making him an enemy to himself and the just ? Is not
that true, Thrasymachus ?

Yes.

And O my friend, I said, surely the gods are just ?

Granted that they are.

But if so, the unjust will be the enemy of the gods, and the
just will be their friend ?

Feast away in triumph, 'and take your fill of the argu-
ment; I will not oppose you, lest I should displease the
company.

Well then, proceed with your answers, and let me have the
remainder of my repast. For we have already shown that
the just are clearly wiser and better and abler than the
unjust, and that the unjust are incapable of common action ;
nay more, that to speak as we did of men who are evil
acting at any time vigorously together, is not strictly true,
for if they had been perfectly evil, they would have laid
hands upon one another; but it is evident that there must
have been some remnant of justice in them, which enabled
them to combine ; if there had not been they would have
injured one another as well as their victims ; they were but
half-villains in their enterprises; for had they been whole
villains, and utterly unjust, they would have been utterly
incapable of action. That, as I believe, is the truth of the
matter, and not what you said at first. But whether the just
have a better and happier life than the unjust is a further
question which we also proposed to consider. I think that
they have, and for the reasons which I have given ; but still

The nature of ends and excellences. 33

I should like to examine further, for no light matter is at
stake, nothing less than the rule of human life.

Proceed. SOCRATES,

I will proceed by asking a question : Would you not say
that a horse has some end ? iiiustra-

tionsof
1 Should. ends and

And the end or use of a horse or of anything would be
that which could not be accomplished, or not so well accom- tory to the
plished, by any other thing ? enquiry

T J J J 1 • , int° the

I do not understand, he said. end and

Let me explain : Can you see, except with the eye ? excellence

Certainly not. s°^he

Or hear, except with the ear ?

No.

These then may be truly said to be the ends of these organs?

They may.

353 But you can cut off a vine-branch with a dagger or with a
chisel, and in many other ways ?

Of course.

And yet not so well as with a pruning-hook made for the
purpose ?

True.

May we not say that this is the end of a pruning-hook ?

We may.

Then now I think you will have no difficulty in under-
standing my meaning when I asked the question whether the
end of anything would be that which could not be accom-
plished, or not so well accomplished, by any other thing ?

I understand your meaning, he said, and assent.

And that to which an end is appointed has also an excel- All things
lence? Need I ask again whether the eye has an end ? which have

J ends have

It has. also virtues

And has not the eye an excellence ? and exce1'

v lences by

* es« which they

And the ear has an end and an excellence also ? fulfil those

T, ends.

True.

And the same is true of all other things ; they have each
of them an end and a special excellence ?
That is so.

Well, and can the eyes fulfil their end if they ate

D

34

Everything has a special end and eoccellence.

Republic

SOCRATES,
THRASYMA-

CHUS.

And the
soul has a
virtue and
an end —
the virtue
justice, the
end happi-
ness.

Hence
justice and
happiness
are neces-
sarily con-
nected.

wanting in their own proper excellence and have a defect
instead ?

How can they, he said, if they are blind and cannot see?

You mean to say, if they have lost their proper excellence,
which is sight ; but I have not arrived at that point yet. I
would rather ask the question more generally, and only en-
quire whether the things which fulfil their ends fulfil them by
their own proper excellence, and fail of fulfilling them by
their own defect ?

Certainly, he replied.

I might say the same of the ears ; when deprived of their
own proper excellence they cannot fulfil their end ?

True.

And the same observation will apply to all other things ?

I agree.

Well ; and has not the soul an end which nothing else can
fulfil? for example, to superintend and command and deli-
berate and the like. Are not these functions proper to the
soul, and can they rightly be assigned to any other ?

To no other.

And is not life to be reckoned among the ends of the soul ?

Assuredly, he said.

And has not the soul an excellence also ?

Yes.

And can she or can she not fulfil her own ends when
deprived of that excellence ?

She cannot.

Then an evil soul must necessarily be an evil ruler and
superintendent, and the good soul a good ruler ?

Yes, necessarily.

And we have admitted that justice is the excellence of the
soul, and injustice the defect of the soul ?

That has been admitted.

Then the just soul and the just man will live well, and the
unjust man will live ill ?

That is what your argument proves.

And he who lives well is blessed and happy, and he who 354
lives ill the reverse of happy ?

Certainly.

Then the just is happy, and the unjust miserable ?

Socrates knows nothing after all. 35

So be it. Republic

But happiness and not misery is profitable.

Of COUrse. ^CRATES,

THRASYMA-

Then, my blessed Thrasymachus, injustice can never be CHUS.
more profitable than justice.

Let this, Socrates, he said, be your entertainment at the
Bendidea.

For which I am indebted to you, I said, now that you have
grown gentle towards me and have left off scolding. Never- Socrates is
theless, I have not been well entertained : but that was my ^pkased

; J with him-

own fault and not yours. As an epicure snatches a taste of self and
every dish which is successively brought to table, he not with the
having allowed himself time to enjoy the one before, so argun
have I gone from one subject to another without having
discovered what I sought at first, the nature of justice. I left
that enquiry and turned away to consider whether justice is
virtue and wisdom or evil and folly; and when there arose a
further question about the comparative advantages of justice
and injustice, I could not refrain from passing on to that.
And the result of the whole discussion has been that I know
nothing at all. For I know not what justice is, and there-
fore I am not likely to know whether it is or is not a virtue,
nor can I say whether the just man is happy or unhappy.

D 2

BOOK II.

Republic
II.

SOCRATES,
GLAUCON.

The three-
fold divi-
sion of
goods.

WITH these words I was thinking that I had made an end steph.
of the discussion ; but the end, in truth, proved to be only 357
a beginning. For Glaucon, who is always the most pug-
nacious of men, was dissatisfied at Thrasymachus' retire-
ment ; he wanted to have the battle out. So he said to me :
Socrates, do you wish really to persuade us, or only to seem
to have persuaded us, that to be just is always better than to
be unjust ?

I should wish really to persuade you, I replied, if I could.

Then you certainly have not succeeded. Let me ask you
now : — How would you arrange goods — are there not some
which we welcome for their own sakes, and independently of
their consequences, as, for example, harmless pleasures and
enjoyments, which delight us at the time, although nothing
follows from them ?

I agree in thinking that there is such a class, I replied.

Is there not also a second class of goods, such as know-
ledge, sight, health, which are desirable not only in them-
selves, but also for their results ?

Certainly, I said.

And would you not recognize a third class, such as gym-
nastic, and the care of the sick, and the physician's art ; also
the various ways of money-making — these do us good but we
regard them as disagreeable ; and no one would choose them
for their own sakes, but only for the sake of some reward or
result which flows from them ?

There is, I said, this third class also. But why do you ask ?

Because I want to know in which of the three classes you
would place justice ?

In the highest class, I replied, — among those goods which 358

The old question resumed. 37

he who would be happy desires both for their own sake and Republic
for the sake of their results.

Then the many are of another mind ; they think that jus-
tice is to be reckoned in the troublesome class, among goods
which are to be pursued for the sake of rewards and of repu-
tation, but in themselves are disagreeable and rather to be
avoided.

I know, I said, that this is their manner of thinking, and
that this was the thesis which Thrasymachus was maintaining
just now, when he censured justice and praised injustice.
But I am too stupid to be convinced by him.

I wish, he said, that you would hear me as well as him, Three
and then I shall see whether you and I agree. For Thra- *£££_
symachus seems to me, like a snake, to have been charmed ment :—
by your voice sooner than he ought to have been ; but to my J- Th^ .na~
mind the nature of justice and injustice have not yet been tice:
made clear. Setting aside their rewards and results, I want 2- Justie.e

i necessity

to know what they are in themselves, and how they inwardly but not a

work in the soul. If you please, then, I will revive the argu-

ment of Thrasymachus. And first I will speak of the nature sonabie-

and origin of justice according to the common view of them, ness of this

Secondly, I will show that all men who practise justice do so

against their will, of necessity, but not as a good. And

thirdly, I will argue that there is reason in this view, for the

life of the unjust is after all better far than the life of the just

— if what they say is true, Socrates, since I myself am not of

their opinion. But still I acknowledge that I am perplexed

when I hear the voices of Thrasymachus and myriads of others

dinning in my ears; and, on the other hand, I have never

yet heard the superiority of justice to injustice maintained by

any one in a satisfactory way. I want to hear justice praised

in respect of itself ; then I shall be satisfied, and you are the

person from whom I think that I am most likely to hear this ;

and therefore I will praise the unjust life to the utmost of my

power, and my manner of speaking will indicate the manner

in which I desire to hear you too praising justice and

censuring injustice. Will you say whether you approve of

my proposal ?

Indeed I do ; nor can I imagine any theme about which a
man of sense would oftener wish to converse.

Republic
II.

GLAUCON.

Justice a
compro-
mise be-
tween do-
ing and
suffering
evil.

The story
of Gyges.

The ring of Gyges.

I am delighted, he replied, to hear you say so, and shall
begin by speaking, as I proposed, of the nature and origin of
justice.

They say that to do injustice is, by nature, good ; to suffer
injustice, evil; but that the evil is greater than the good.
And so when men have both done and suffered injustice and
have had experience of both, not being able to avoid the one 359
and obtain the other, they think that they had better agree
among themselves to have neither ; hence there arise laws
and mutual covenants ; and that which is ordained by law is
termed by them lawful and just. This they affirm to be the
origin and nature of justice ; — it is a mean or compromise,
between the best of all, which is to do injustice and not be
punished, and the worst of all, which is to suffer injustice
without the power of retaliation ; and justice, being at a
middle point between the two, is tolerated not as a good, but
as the lesser evil, and honoured by reason of the inability of
men to do injustice. For no man who is worthy to be called
a man would ever submit to such an agreement if he were
able to resist; he would be mad if he did. Such is the
received account, Socrates, of the nature and origin of
justice.

Now that those who practise justice do so involuntarily
and because they have not the power to be unjust will best
appear if we imagine something of this kind : having given
both to the just and the unjust power to do what they will,
let us watch and see whither desire will lead them ; then we
shall discover in the very act the just and unjust man to be
proceeding along the same road, following their interest,
which all natures deem to be their good, and are only di-
verted into the path of justice by the force of law. The
liberty which we are supposing may be most completely
given to them in the form of such a power as is said to have
been possessed by Gyges, the ancestor of Croesus the Ly-
dian \ According to the tradition, Gyges was a shepherd in
the service of the king of Lydia ; there was a great storm,
and an earthquake made an opening in the earth at the place
where he was feeding his flock. Amazed at the sight, he

1 Reading Tvyrj r<p Kpoiffov rov AvSov tepoy&vy.

Who would be just if he could not be found out f 39

descended into the opening, where, among other marvels, he Republic
beheld a hollow brazen horse, having doors, at which he
stooping and looking in saw a dead body of stature, as GLAUCON-
appeared to him, more than human, and having nothing on
but a gold ring ; this he took from the finger of the dead and
reascended. Now the shepherds met together, according to
custom, that they might send their monthly report about the
flocks to the king ; into their assembly he came having the
ring on his finger, and as he was sitting among them he
chanced to turn the collet of the ring inside his hand, when
instantly he became invisible to the rest of the company and
they began to speak of him as if he were no longer present.
360 He was astonished at this, and again touching the ring he
turned the collet outwards and reappeared ; he made several
trials of the ring, and always with the same result — when he
turned the collet inwards he became invisible, when out-
wards he reappeared. Whereupon he contrived to be chosen
one of the messengers who were sent to the court ; where as
soon as he arrived he seduced the queen, and with her help
conspired against the king and slew him, and took the king-
dom. Suppose now that there were two such magic rings, The appii-
and the just put on one of them and the unjust the other ; no ^ ™Q°f
man can be imagined to be of such an iron nature that he of Gyges.
would stand fast in justice. No man would keep his hands
off what was not his own when he could safely take what he
liked out of the market, or go into houses and lie with any
one at his pleasure, or kill or release from prison whom he
would, and in all respects be like a God among men. Then
the actions of the just would be as the actions of the unjust ;
they would both come at last to the same point. And this
we may truly affirm to be a great proof that a man is just,
not willingly or because he thinks that justice is any good to
him individually, but of necessity, for wherever any one
thinks that he can safely be unjust, there he is unjust. For
all men believe in their hearts that injustice is far more
profitable to the individual than justice, and he who argues
as I have been supposing, will say that they are right. If
you could imagine any one obtaining this power of becoming
invisible, and never doing any wrong or touching what was
another's, he would be thought by the lookers-on to be a

The just and unjust stripped of appearances.

Republic
II.

GLAUCON.

The unjust
to be
clothed
with power
and repu-
tation.

The just
to be un-
clothed of
all but his
virtue.

most wretched idiot, although they would praise him to one
another's faces, and keep up appearances with one another
from a fear that they too might suffer injustice. Enough of
this.

Now, if we are to form a real judgment of the life of the
just and unjust, we must isolate them ; there is no other
way ; and how is the isolation to be effected ? I answer :
Let the unjust man be entirely unjust, and the just man
entirely just ; nothing is to be taken away from either of
them, and both are to be perfectly furnished for the work of
their respective lives. First, let the unjust be like other
distinguished masters of craft ; like the skilful pilot or
physician, who knows intuitively his own powers and keeps 361
within their limits, and who, if he fails at any point, is able
to recover himself. So let the unjust make his unjust at-
tempts in the right way, and lie hidden if he means to be
great in his injustice : (he who is found out is nobody :) for
the highest reach of injustice is, to be deemed just when you
are not. Therefore I say that in the perfectly unjust man
we must assume the most perfect injustice ; there is to be no
deduction, but we must allow him, while doing the most
unjust acts, to have acquired the greatest reputation for
justice. If he have taken a false step he must be able to
recover himself; he must be one who can speak with effect, if
any of his deeds come to light, and who can force his way
where force is required by his courage and strength, and com-
mand of money and friends. And at his side let us place the
just man in his nobleness and simplicity, wishing, as Aeschy-
lus says, to be and not to seem good. There must be no
seeming, for if he seem to be just he will be honoured and
rewarded, and then we shall not know whether he is just for
the sake of justice or for the sake of honours and rewards ;
therefore, let him be clothed in justice only, and have no
other covering ; and he must be imagined in a state of life
the opposite of the former. Let him be the best of men, and
let him be thought the worst ; then he will have been put to
the proof; and we shall see whether he will be affected by
the fear of infamy and its consequences. And let him con-
tinue thus to the hour of death ; being just and seeming to
IDC Unjust. When both have reached the uttermost extreme,

The just in torments, the wicked in prosperity. 41

the one of justice and the other of injustice, let judgment be Republi
given which of them is the happier of the two.

c

Heavens ! my dear Glaucon, I said, how energetically you
polish them up for the decision, first one and then the other,
as if they were two statues.

I do my best, he said. And now that we know what they
are like there is no difficulty in tracing out the sort of life
which awaits either of them. This I will proceed to describe ;
but as you may think the description a little too coarse, I ask
you to suppose, Socrates, that the words which follow are
not mine. — Let me put them into the mouths of the eulogists
of injustice : They will tell you that the just man who is
thought unjust will be scourged, racked, bound — will have
his eyes burnt out ; and, at last, after suffering every kind of
evil, he will be impaled : Then he will understand that he The just
362 ought to seem only, and not to be, just ; the words of J^^^1
Aeschylus maybe more truly spoken of the unjust than of eachexpe-
the just. For the unjust is pursuing a reality ; he does not ^^ *at
live with a view to appearances — he wants to be really unjust to seem
and not to seem only :— £*£* to

1 His mind has a soil deep and fertile,
Out of which spring his prudent counsels V

In the first place, he is thought just, and therefore bears rule
in the city; he can marry whom he will, and give in marriage
to whom he will ; also he can trade and deal where he likes, The unjust
and always to his own advantage, because he has no mis- 1^°*^.,.
givings about injustice ; and at every contest, whether in will attain
public or private, he gets the better of his antagonists, and ^^rt
gains at their expense, and is rich, and out of his gains he perity.
can benefit his friends, and harm his enemies ; moreover, he
can offer sacrifices, and dedicate gifts to the gods abundantly
and magnificently, and can honour the gods or any man
whom he wants to honour in a far better style than the just,
and therefore he is likely to be dearer than they are to the
gods. And thus, Socrates, gods and men are said to unite
in making the life of the unjust better than the life of the just.
I was going to say something in answer to Glaucon, when

1 Seven against Thebes, 574.

' The temporal dispensation'

Republic
II.

ADEIMANTUS,
SOCRATES.

Adeiman-
tus takes
up the
argument.
Justice is
praised and
injustice
blamed, but
only out of
regard to
their con-
sequences.

The re-
wards and

Adeimantus, his brother, interposed : Socrates, he said, you
do not suppose that there is nothing more to be urged ?

Why, what else is there ? I answered.

The strongest point of all has not been even mentioned, he
replied.

Well, then, according to the proverb, ' Let brother help
brother ' — if he fails in any part do you assist him ; although
I must confess that Glaucon has already said quite enough
to lay me in the dust, and take from me the power of helping
justice.

Nonsense, he replied. But let me add something more :
There is another side to Glaucon's argument about the praise
and censure of justice and injustice, which is equally required
in order to bring out what I believe to be his meaning.
Parents and tutors are always telling their sons and their
wards that they are to be just ; but why ? not for the sake of 363
justice, but for the sake of character and reputation ; in the
hope of obtaining for him who is reputed just some of those
offices, marriages, and the like which Glaucon has enumerated
among the advantages accruing to the unjust from the repu-
tation of justice. More, however,, is made of appearances by
this class of persons than by the others ; for they throw in
the good opinion of the gods, and will tell you of a shower
of benefits which the heavens, as they say, rain upon the
pious ; and this accords with the testimony of the noble
Hesiod and Homer, the first of whom says, that the gods
make the oaks of the just —

* To bear acorns at their summit, and bees in the middle ;
And the sheep are bowed down with the weight of their fleeces1,'

and many other blessings of a like kind are provided for
them. And Homer has a very similar strain; for he speaks
of one whose fame is —

* As the fame of some blameless king who, like a god,
Maintains justice ; to whom the black earth brings forth
Wheat and barley, whose trees are bowed with fruit,
And his sheep never fail to bear, and the sea gives him fish V

Still grander are the gifts of heaven which Musaeus and his
son 3 vouchsafe to the just ; they take them down into the ,

Hesiod, Works and Days, 230. 2 Homer, Od. xix. 109.

Eumolpus.

Immoral and impious opinions and beliefs. 43

world below, where they have the saints lying on couches Republic

at a feast, everlastingly drunk, crowned with garlands ; their

idea seems to be that an immortality of drunkenness is the ADEIMANTUS-

highest meed of virtue. Some extend their rewards yet
further ; the posterity, as they say, of the faithful and just another
shall survive to the third and fourth generation. This is the hfe<
style in which they praise justice. But about the wicked
there is another strain; they bury them in a slough in
Hades, and make them carry water in a sieve ; also while
they are yet living they bring them to infamy, and inflict
upon them the punishments which Glaucon described as the
portion of the just who are reputed to be unjust ; nothing
else does their invention supply. Such is their manner of
praising the one and censuring the other.

Once more, Socrates, I will ask you to consider another way Men are
of speaking about justice and injustice, which is not confined ale^^s re~
364 to the poets, but is found in prose writers. The universal that virtue
voice of mankind is always declaring that justice and virtue jfjj9^1
are honourable, but grievous and toilsome ; and that the pleasant.
pleasures of vice and injustice are easy of attainment, and are
only censured by law and opinion. They say also that honesty
is for the most part less profitable than dishonesty ; and they
are quite ready to call wicked men happy, and to honour
them both in public and private when they are rich or in any
other way influential, while they despise and overlook those
who may be weak and poor, even though acknowledging
them to be better than the others. But most extraordinary
of all is their mode of speaking about virtue and the gods :
they say that the gods apportion calamity and misery to
many good men, and good and happiness to the wicked.
And mendicant prophets go to rich men's doors and per-
suade them that they have a power committed to them
by the gods of making an atonement for a man's own
or his ancestor's sins by sacrifices or charms, with re-
joicings and feasts; and they promise to harm an enemy,
whether just or unjust, at a small cost; with magic arts
and incantations binding heaven, as they say, to execute
their will. And the poets are the authorities to whom they
appeal, now smoothing the path of vice with the words of
Hesiod : —

44

The effect on the mind of youth.

Republic
II.

' Vice may be had in abundance without trouble ; the way is
smooth and her dwelling-place is near. But before virtue the

ADEIMANTUS. gods have Set toil V

They are
taught that
sins may
be easily
expiated.

The effects
of all this
upon the
youthful
mind.

and a tedious and uphill road : then citing Homer as a
witness that the gods may be influenced by men ; for he
also says : —

* The gods, too, may be turned from their purpose ; and men
pray to them and avert their wrath by sacrifices and soothing
entreaties, and by libations and the odour of fat, when they have
sinned and transgressed V

And they produce a host of books written by Musaeus and
Orpheus, who were children of the Moon and the Muses —
that is what they say — according to which they perform their
ritual, and persuade not only individuals, but whole cities,
that expiations and atonements for sin may be made by
sacrifices and amusements which fill a vacant hour, and are
equally at the service of the living and the dead ; the latter
sort they call mysteries, and they redeem us from the pains 365
of hell, but if we neglect them no one knows what awaits us.
He proceeded : And now when the young hear all this said
about virtue and vice, and the way in which gods and men
regard them, how are their minds likely to be affected, my
dear Socrates, — those of them, I mean, who are quickwitted,
and, like bees on the wing, light on every flower, and from
all that they hear are prone to draw conclusions as to what
manner of persons they should be and in what way they
should walk if they would make the best of life ? Probably
the youth will say to himself in the words of Pindar —

' Can I by justice or by crooked ways of deceit ascend a loftier
tower which may be a fortress to me all my days ? '

For what men say is that, if I am really just and am not also
thought just, profit there is none, but the pain and loss on
the other hand are unmistakeable. But if, though unjust,
I acquire the reputation of justice, a heavenly life is promised
to me. Since then, as philosophers prove, appearance tyran-
nizes over truth and is lord of happiness, to appearance I
must devote myself. I will describe around me a picture
and shadow of virtue to be the vestibule and exterior of my

Hesiod, Works and Days, 287.

2 Homer, Iliad, ix. 493.

' Let us make the best of both worlds' 45

house; behind I will trail the subtle and crafty fox, as Republic
Archilochus, greatest of sages, recommends. But I hear 7/'
some one exclaiming that the concealment of wickedness is ADEIMANTUS-
often difficult; to which I answer, Nothing great is easy.
Nevertheless, the argument indicates this, if we would be
happy, to be the path along which we should proceed. With
a view to concealment we will establish secret brotherhoods
and political clubs. And there are professors of rhetoric who
teach the art of persuading courts and assemblies ; and so,
partly by persuasion and partly by force, I shall make un-
lawful gains and not be punished. Still I hear a voice
saying that the gods cannot be deceived, neither can they
be compelled. But what if there are no gods ? or, suppose
them to have no care of human things — why in either case
should we mind about concealment? And even if there Theexist-
are gods, and they do care about us, yet we know of them ^shfonT
only from tradition and the genealogies of the poets ; and known to
these are the very persons who say that they may be in- ^ethr^J|h
fluenced and turned by ' sacrifices and soothing entreaties who like-'
and by offerings.' Let us be consistent then, and believe
both or neither. If the poets speak truly, why then we had maybe
366 better be unjust, and offer of the fruits of injustice; for if we fhna^ea
are just, although we may escape the vengeance of heaven, are very
we shall lose the gains of injustice; but, if we are unjust, we Jead? to
shall keep the gains, and by our sinning and praying, and
praying and sinning, the gods will be propitiated, and we
shall not be punished. ' But there is a world below in which
either we or our posterity will suffer for our unjust deeds.'
Yes, my friend, will be the reflection, but there are mysteries
and atoning deities, and these have great power. That is
what mighty cities declare ; and the children of the gods,
who were their poets and prophets, bear a like testimony.

On what principle, then, shall we any longer choose justice
rather than the worst injustice ? when, if we only unite the
latter with a deceitful regard to appearances, we shall fare to
our mind both with gods and men, in life and after death, as
the most numerous and the highest authorities tell us. Know-
ing all this, Socrates, how can a man who has any superiority
of mind or person or rank or wealth, be willing to honour
justice; or indeed to refrain from laughing when he hears

The impassioned peroration of Adeimantus.

Republic
II.

ADEIMANTUS.
All this,
even if not
absolutely
true, af-
fords great
excuse for
doing
wrong.

Men should
be taught
that justice
is in itself
the greatest
good and
injustice
the greatest
evil.

justice praised ? And even if there should be some one who
is able to disprove the truth of my words, and who is satisfied
that justice is best, still he is not angry with the unjust, but
is very ready to forgive them, because he also knows that men
are not just of their own free will ; unless, peradventure, there
be some one whom the divinity within him may have inspired
with a hatred of injustice, or who has attained knowledge of
the truth — but no other man. He only blames injustice who,
owing to cowardice or age or some weakness, has not the
power of being unjust. And this is proved by the fact that
when he obtains the power, he immediately becomes unjust as
far as he can be.

The cause of all this, Socrates, was indicated by us at the
beginning of the argument, when my brother and I told you
how astonished we were to find that of all the professing
panegyrists of justice — beginning with the ancient heroes of
whom any memorial has been preserved to us, and ending
with the men of our own time — no one has ever blamed
injustice or praised justice except with a view to the glories,
honours, and benefits which flow from them. No one has
ever adequately described either in verse or prose the true
essential nature of either of them abiding in the soul, and
invisible to any human or divine eye ; or shown that of all
the things of a man's soul which he has within him, justice is
the greatest good, and injustice the greatest evil. Had this 367
been the universal strain, had you sought to persuade us of
this from our youth upwards, we should not have been on
the watch to keep one another from doing wrong, but every
one would have been his own watchman, because afraid, if he
did wrong, of harbouring in himself the greatest of evils. I
dare say that Thrasymachus and others would seriously hold
the language which I have been merely repeating, and words
even stronger than these about justice and injustice, grossly,
as I conceive, perverting their true nature. But I speak in
this vehement manner, as I must frankly confess to you,
because I want to hear from you the opposite side ; and I
would ask you to show not only the superiority which justice
has over injustice, but what effect they have on the possessor
of them which makes the one to be a good and the other an
evil to him. And please, as Glaucon requested of you, to

The genius of Glaucon and Adeimantus. 47

exclude reputations ; for unless you take away from each of Republic
them his true reputation and add on the false, we shall say
that you do not praise justice, but the appearance of it; 5™™?™*'
we shall think that you are only exhorting us to keep in-
justice dark, and that you really agree with Thrasymachus
in thinking that justice is another's good and the interest of
the stronger, and that injustice is a man's own profit and
interest, though injurious to the weaker. Now as you have
admitted that justice is one of that highest class of goods
which are desired indeed for their results, but in a far greater
degree for their own sakes — like sight or hearing or know-
ledge or health, or any other real and natural and not merely
conventional good — I would ask you in your praise of justice
to regard one point only : I mean the essential good and evil
which justice and injustice work in the possessors of them.
Let others praise justice and censure injustice, magnifying
the rewards and honours of the one and abusing the other ;
that is a manner of arguing which, coming from them, I am
ready to tolerate, but from you who have spent your whole life
in the consideration of this question, unless I hear the contrary
from your own lips, I expect something better. And there-
fore, I say, not only prove to us that justice is better than
injustice, but show what they either of them do to the
possessor of them, which makes the one to be a good and
the other an evil, whether seen or unseen by gods and men.

I had always admired the genius of Glaucon and Adei-
mantus, but on hearing these words I was quite delighted,
368 and said : Sons of an illustrious father, that was not a bad
beginning of the Elegiac verses which the admirer of Glaucon
made in honour of you after you had distinguished yourselves
at the battle of Megara : —

*Sons of Ariston,' he sang, 'divine offspring of an illustrious hero.'

The epithet is very appropriate, for there is something truly Glaucon
divine in being able to argue as you have done for the supe- J^^f61"
riority of injustice, and remaining unconvinced by your own able to
arguments. And I do believe that you are not convinced — argue so
this I infer from your general character, for had I judged uncon-
only from your speeches I should have mistrusted you. But ™ced by

cj . . their own

now, the greater my confidence in you, the greater is my arguments

The individiial and the State.

Republic
II.

SOCRATES,
ADEIMANTUS.

The large
letters.

Justice to
be seen in
the State
more easily
than in the
individual.

difficulty in knowing what to say. For I am in a strait
between two ; on the one hand I feel that I am unequal
to the task ; and my inability is brought home to me by the
fact that you were not satisfied with the answer which I made
to Thrasymachus, proving, as I thought, the superiority
which justice has over injustice. And yet I cannot refuse to
help, while breath and speech remain to me; I am afraid
that there would be an impiety in being present when justice
is evil spoken of and not lifting up a hand in her defence.
And therefore I had best give such help as I can.

Glaucon and the rest entreated me by all means not to let
the question drop, but to proceed in the investigation. They
wanted to arrive at the truth, first, about the nature of justice
and injustice, and secondly, about their relative advantages.
I told them, what I really thought, that the enquiry would be
of a serious nature, and would require very good eyes.
Seeing then, I said, that we are no great wits, I think that
we had better adopt a method which I may illustrate thus ;
suppose that a short-sighted person had been asked by some
one to read small letters from a distance ; and it occurred to
some one else that they might be found in another place
which was larger and in which the letters were larger— if
they were the same and he could read the larger letters first,
and then proceed to the lesser — this would have been thought
a rare piece of good fortune.

Very true, said Adeimantus ; but how does the illustration
apply to our enquiry ?

I will tell you, I replied ; justice, which is the subject of
our enquiry, is, as you know, sometimes spoken of as the
virtue of an individual, and sometimes as the virtue of a
State.

True, he replied.

And is not a State larger than an individual ?

It is.

Then in the larger the quantity of justice is likely to be
larger and more easily discernible. I propose therefore that
we enquire into the nature of justice and injustice, first as
they appear in the State, and secondly in the individual, 369
proceeding from the greater to the lesser and comparing
them.

The origin of the State. 49

That, he said, is an excellent proposal. Republic

And if we imagine the State in process of creation, we

shall see the justice, and injustice of the State in process
of creation also.

I dare say.

When the State is completed there may be a hope that the
object of our search will be more easily discovered.

Yes, far more easily.

But ought we to attempt to construct one ? I said ; for to
do so, as I am inclined to think, will be a very serious task.
Reflect therefore.

I have reflected, said Adeimantus, and am anxious that
you should proceed.

A State, I said, arises, as I conceive, out of the needs The State
of mankind ; no one is self-sufficing, but all of us have many U^g°u
wants. Can any other origin of a State be imagined ? wants of

There can be no other. men-

Then, as we have many wants, and many persons are
needed to supply them, one takes a helper for one purpose
and another for another; and when these partners and
helpers are gathered together in one habitation the body of
inhabitants is termed a State.

True, he said.

And they exchange with one another, and one gives, and
another receives, under the idea that the exchange will be for
their good.

Very true.

Then, I said, let us begin and create in idea a State ; and
yet the true creator is necessity, who is the mother of our
invention.

Of course, he replied.

Now the first and greatest of necessities is food, which is The four or
the condition of life and existence. need^of**

Certainly. life, and the

The second is a dwelling, and the third clothing and the gnds°of ve

like. citizens

True. whoc°r-

respond to

And now let us see how our city will be able to supply them.
this great demand : We may suppose that one man is a
husbandman, another a builder, some one else a weaver —

E

The barest notion of a State.

Republic
II.

SOCRATES,
ADEIMANTUS.

The divi-
sion of
labour.

The first
citizens
are : — i. a
husband-
man,

shall we add to them a shoemaker, or perhaps some other
purveyor to our bodily wants ?

Quite right.

The barest notion of a State must include four or five men.

Clearly.

And how will they proceed ? Will each bring the result
of his labours into a common stock ? — the individual hus-
bandman, for example, producing for four, and labouring
four times as long and as much as he need in the provision
of food with which he supplies others as well as himself; or
will he have nothing to do with others and not be at the
trouble of producing for them, but provide for himself alone
a fourth of the food in a fourth of the time, and in the 370
remaining three fourths of his time be employed in making
a house or a coat or a pair of shoes, having no partnership
with others, but supplying himself all his own wants ?

Adeimantus thought that he should aim at producing food
only and not at producing everything.

Probably, I replied, that would be the better way; and
when I hear you say this, I am myself reminded that we are
not all alike ; there are diversities of natures among us which
are adapted to different occupations.

Very true.

And will you have a work better done when the workman
has many occupations, or when he has only one ?

When he has only one.

Further, there can be no doubt that a work is spoilt when
not done at the right time ?

No doubt.

For business is not disposed to wait until the doer of the
business is at leisure ; but the doer must follow up what he
is doing, and make the business his first object.

He must.

And if so, we must infer that all things are produced more
plentifully and easily and of a better quality when one man
does one thing which is natural to him and does it at the
right time, and leaves other things.

Undoubtedly.

Then more than four citizens will be required; for the
husbandman will not make his own plough or mattock, or

More than four or Jive citizens are required. 5 1

other implements of agriculture, if they are to be good for any- Republic
thing. Neither will the builder make his tools — and he too 7/'
needs many ; and in like manner the weaver and shoemaker. SocRATES«

„ ADEIMANTUS.

irue.

Then carpenters, and smiths, and many other artisans, will 3.'
be sharers in our little State, which is already beginning to 4- a shoe-

0 maker.

§row? To these

True. must be

Yet even if we add neatherds, shepherds, and other herds- jfaciaT
men, in order that our husbandmen may have oxen to plough penter, 6. a
with, and builders as well as husbandmen may have draught ^"mer-6'0''
cattle, and curriers and weavers fleeces and hides, — still our chants,
State will not be very large.

That is true ; yet neither will it be a very small State which
contains all these.

Then, again, there is the situation of the city— to find a place
where nothing need be imported is wellnigh impossible.

Impossible.

Then there must be another class of citizens who will bring
the required supply from another city ?

There must.

371 But if the trader goes empty-handed, having nothing which
they require who would supply his need, he will come back
empty-handed.

That is certain.

And therefore what they produce at home must be not only
enough for themselves, but such both in quantity and quality
as to accommodate those from whom their wants are supplied.

Very true.

Then more husbandmen and more artisans will be required ?

They will.

Not to mention the importers and exporters, who are called
merchants ?

Yes.

Then we shall want merchants ?

We shall.

And if merchandise is to be carried over the sea, skilful
sailors will also be needed, and in considerable numbers ?

Yes, in considerable numbers.
; Then, again, within the city, how will they exchange their

£ 2

52 New wants and new classes.

Republic productions ? To secure such an exchange was, as you will
remember, one of our principal objects when we formed

t^lem into a society and constituted a State.

Clearly they will buy and sell.

Then they will need a market-place, and a money- token
for purposes of exchange.

Certainly.

The origin Suppose now that a husbandman, or an artisan, brings
trade"1 some production to market, and he comes at a time when
there is no one to exchange with him, — is he to leave his
calling and sit idle in the market-place ?

Not at all ; he will find people there who, seeing the want,
undertake the office of salesmen. In well-ordered states they
are commonly those who are the weakest in bodily strength,
and therefore of little use for any other purpose ; their duty is
to be in the market, and to give money in exchange for goods
to those who desire to sell arid to take money from those
who desire to buy.

This want, then, creates a class of retail-traders in our
State. Is not 'retailer* the term which is applied to those
who sit in the market-place engaged in buying and selling,
while those who wander from one city tq another are called
merchants ?

Yes, he said.

And there is another class of servants, who are intellectually
hardly on the level of companionship ; still they have plenty
of bodily strength for labour, which accordingly they sell, and
are called, if I do not mistake, hirelings, hire being the name
which is given to the price of their labour.

True.

Then hirelings will help to make up our population ?

Yes.

And now, Adeimantus, is our State matured and perfected ?

I think so.

Where, then, is justice, and where is injustice, and in what
part of the State did they spring up ?

Probably in the dealings of these citizens with one another. 372
I cannot imagine that they are more likely to be found
any where else.

I dare say that you are right in your suggestion, I said ;

A city of pigs. 53

we had better think the matter out, and not shrink from the Republic
enquiry.

Let us then consider, first of all, what will be their way of SocRATES>
life, now that we have thus established them. Will they not A picture
produce corn, and wine, and clothes, and shoes, and build of primitive
houses for themselves ? And when they are housed, they will llfe*
work, in summer, commonly, stripped and barefoot, but in
winter substantially clothed and shod. They will feed on
barley-meal and flour of wheat, baking and kneading them,
making noble cakes and loaves ; these they will serve up on
a mat of reeds or on clean leaves, themselves reclining the
while upon beds strewn with yew or myrtle And they and
their children will feast, drinking of the wine which they have
made, wearing garlands on their heads, and hymning the '
praises of the gods, in happy converse with one another.
And they will take care that their families do not exceed their
means ; having an eye to poverty or war.

But, said Glaucon, interposing, you have not given them
a relish to their meal.

True, I replied, I had forgotten ; of course they must have
a relish — salt, and olives, and cheese, and they will boil roots
and herbs such as country people prepare; for a dessert
we shall give them figs, and peas, and beans; and they
will roast myrtle- berries and acorns at the fire, drinking in
moderation. And with such a diet they may be expected to
live in peace and health to a good old age, and bequeath a
similar life to their children after them.

Yes, Socrates, he said, and if you were providing for a city
of pigs, how else would you feed the beasts ?

But what would you have, Glaucon ? I replied.

Why, he said, you should give them the ordinary con-
veniences of life. People who are to be comfortable are
accustomed to lie on sofas, and dine off tables, and they should
have sauces and sweets in the modern style.

Yes, I said, now I understand : the question which you A luxurious
would have me consider is, not only how a State, but how a State must

•* be called

luxurious State is created ; and possibly there is no harm in into exist-
this, for in such a State we shall be more likely to see ence-
how justice and injustice originate. In my opinion the true
and healthy constitution of the State is the one which I have

54

Not a mere State but a luxurious State.

Republic
II.

SOCRATES,
GLAUCON.

and in this
many new
callings
will be re-
quired.

The terri-
tory of our
State must
be en-
larged; and
hence will
arise war
between us
and our
neigh-
bours.

described. But if you wish also to see a State at fever-heat,
I have no objection. For I suspect that many will not be
satisfied with the simpler way of life. They will be for adding 373
sofas, and tables, and other furniture ; also dainties, and per-
fumes, and incense, and courtesans, and cakes, all these not
of one sort only, but in every variety ; we must go beyond the
necessaries of which I was at first speaking, such as houses,
and clothes, and shoes : the arts of the painter and the
embroiderer will have to be set in motion, and gold and ivory
and all sorts of materials must be procured.

True, he said.

Then we must enlarge our borders; for the original
healthy State is no longer sufficient. Now will the city have
to fill and swell with a multitude of callings which are not
required by any natural want; such as the whole tribe of
hunters and actors, of whom one large class have to do with
forms and colours ; another will be the votaries of music —
poets and their attendant train of rhapsodists, players, dancers,
contractors ; also makers of divers kinds of articles, including
women's dresses. And we shall want more servants. Will
not tutors be also in request, and nurses wet and dry,
tirewomen and barbers, as well as confectioners and cooks ;
and swineherds, too, who were not needed and therefore had
no place in the former edition of our State, but are needed
now ? They must not be forgotten : and there will be
animals of many other kinds, if people eat them.

Certainly.

And living in this way we shall have much greater need of
physicians than before ?

Much greater.

And the country which was enough to support the original
inhabitants will be too small now, and not enough ?

Quite true.

Then a slice of our neighbours' land will be wanted by us
for pasture and tillage, and they will want a slice of ours, if,
like ourselves, they exceed the limit of necessity, and give
themselves up to the unlimited accumulation of wealth ?

That, Socrates, will be inevitable.

And so we shall go to war, Glaucon. Shall we not ?

Most certainly, he replied.

The origin of war. 55

Then, without determining as yet whether war does good Republic
or harm, . thus much we may affirm, that now we have dis- /7>

covered war to be derived from causes which are also the
causes of almost all the evils in States, private as well as
public.

Undoubtedly.

And our State must once more enlarge ; and this time the

enlargement will be nothing short of a whole army, which

374 will have to go out and fight with the invaders for all that we

have, as well as for the things and persons whom we were

describing above. ••.• ",

Why ? he said ; are they not capable of defending them-
selves ?

No, I said ; not if we were right in the principle which War is an
was acknowledged by all of us when we were framing the ^a^can*
State : the principle, as you will remember, was that one be pursued
man cannot practise many arts with success. wlth su,c"

r cess unless

Very true, he said. a man's

But is not war an art ? whole at-

^ . . tentionis

Certainly. devoted to

And an art requiring as much attention as shoemaking ? il« a soldier

^ . cannot be

Quite true. allowed to

And the shoemaker was not allowed by us to be a husband- exercise
man, or a weaver, or a builder— in order that we might have J^t wf"1^
our shoes well made ; but to him and to every other worker own.
was assigned one work for which he was by nature fitted, and
at that he was to continue working all his life long and at no
other; he was not to let opportunities slip, and then he
would become a good workman. Now nothing can be more
important than that the work of a soldier should be well
done. But is war an art so easily acquired that a man may The war-
be a warrior who is also a husbandman, or shoemaker, or requ^e^a
other artisan ; although no one in the world would be a good long ap-
dice or draught player who merely took up the game as a g^nt^
recreation, and had not from his earliest years devoted him- many na-
self to this and nothing else? No tools will make a man a turai gifts.
skilled workman, or master of defence, nor be of any use to
him who has not learned how to handle them, and has never
bestowed any attention upon them. How then will he who
takes up a shield or other implement of war become a good

The soldier should be like a watch-dog,

Republic
II.

SOCRATES,
GLADCON.

The selec-
tion of
guardians:

fighter all in a day, whether with heavy-armed or any other
kind of troops ?

Yes, he said, the tools which would teach men their own
use would be beyond price.

And the higher the duties of the guardian, I said, the more
time, and skill, and art, and application will be needed by him?

No doubt, he replied.

Will he not also require natural aptitude for his calling ?

Certainly.

Then it will be our duty to select, if we can, natures which
are fitted for the task of guarding the city ?

It will

And the selection will be no easy matter, I said ; but we
must be brave and do our best.

We must.

Is not the noble youth very like a well-bred dog in respect 375
of guarding and watching ?

What do you mean ?

I mean that both of them ought to be quick to see, and swift
to overtake the enemy when they see him ; and strong too if,
when they have caught him, they have to fight with him.

All these qualities, he replied, will certainly be required by
them.

Well, and your guardian must be brave if he is to fight
well?

Certainly.

And is he likely to be brave who has no spirit, whether
horse or dog or any other animal ? Have you never observed
how invincible and unconquerable is spirit and how the pre-
sence of it makes the soul of any creature to be absolutely
fearless and indomitable ?

I have.

Then now we have a clear notion of the bodily qualities
which are required in the guardian.

True.

And also of the mental ones; his soul is to be full of
spirit ?

Yes.

But are not these spirited natures apt to be savage with
one another, and with everybody else ?

gentle to friends, and dangerous to enemies. 5 7

A difficulty by no means easy to overcome, he replied. Republic

Whereas, I said, they ought to be dangerous to their

enemies, and gentle to their friends ; if not, they will de-
stroy themselves without waiting for their enemies to destroy
them.

True, he said.

What is to be done then ? I said ; how shall we find a
gentle nature which has also a great spirit, for the one is the
contradiction of the other ?

True.

He will not be a good guardian who is wanting in either of The guard-

these two qualities ; and yet the combination of them appears lar^
to be impossible ; and hence we must infer that to be a good opposite
guardian is impossible. qualities of

. . . gentleness

I am afraid that what you say is true, he replied. and spirit.

Here feeling perplexed I began to think over what had
preceded. — My friend, I said, no wonder that we are in a
perplexity ; for we have lost sight of the image which we had
before us.

What do you mean ? he said.

I mean to say that there do exist natures gifted with those
opposite qualities.

And where do you find them ?

Many animals, I replied, furnish examples of them ; our Such a
friend the dog is a very good one : you know that well-bred £o™ mT"
dogs are perfectly gentle to their familiars and acquaintances, be observed
and the reverse to strangers. in the d°£-

Yes, I know.

Then there is nothing impossible or out of the order of
nature in our finding la guardian who has a similar combina-
tion of qualities ?

Certainly not.

Would not he who is fitted to be a guardian, besides the
spirited nature, need to have the qualities of a philosopher ?

I do not apprehend your meaning.

376 The trait of which I am speaking, I replied, may be also
seen in the dog, and is remarkable in the animal.

What trait ?

Why, a dog, whenever he sees a stranger, is angry ; when Jstein^°g
an acquaintance, he welcomes him, although the one has guishes

The dog a philosopher.

Republic
II.

SOCRATES,
GLAUCON,
ADEIMANTUS.

friend and
enemy by
the crite-
rion of
knowing
and not
knowing :

whereby he
is shown
to be a phi-
losopher.

How are
our citi-
zens to be
reared and
educated?

never done him any harm, nor the other any good. Did this
never strike you as curious ?

The matter never struck me before ; but I quite recognise
the truth of your remark.

And surely this instinct of the dog is very charming ; —
your dog is a true philosopher.

Why?

Why, because he distinguishes the face of a friend and of
an enemy only by the criterion of knowing and not knowing.
And must not an animal be a lover of learning who deter-
mines what he likes and dislikes by the test of knowledge
and ignorance ?

Most assuredly.

And is not the love of learning the love of wisdom, which
is philosophy ?

They are the same, he replied.

And may we not say confidently of man ,also, that he who
is likely to be gentle to his friends and acquaintances, must
by nature be a lover of wisdom and knowledge ?

That we may safely affirm.

Then he who ist to be a really good and noble guardian of
the State will require to unite in himself philosophy and
spirit and swiftness and strength ?

Undoubtedly.

Then we have found the desired natures; and now that
we have found them, how are they to be reared and educated ?
Is not this an enquiry which may be expected to throw light
on the greater enquiry which is our final end — How do
justice and injustice grow up in States ? for we do not want
either to omit what is to the point or to draw out the argu-
ment to an inconvenient length.

Adeimantus thought that the enquiry would be of great
service to us.

Then, I said, my dear friend, the task must not be given up,
even if somewhat long.

Certainly not.

Come then, and let us pass a leisure hour in story-telling,
and our story shall be the education of our heroes.

By all means.

And what shall be their education ? Can we find a better

Education of two kinds. 59

than the traditional sort? — and this has two divisions, Republic
gymnastic for the body, and music for the soul.

True< SOCRATES,

ADEIMANTUS.

Shall we begin education with music, and go on to Education

gymnastic afterwards ? divided

By all means. j^f-

And when you speak of music, do you include literature or the body

not -p and music

for the soul.
I do. Music

And literature may be either true or false ? !ncludes

J literature,

V 63. which may

377 And the young should be trained in both kinds, and we £e true or
begin with the false ?

I do not understand your meaning, he said.

You know, I said, that we begin by telling children stories
which, though not wholly destitute of truth, are in the main
fictitious ; and these stories are told them when they are not
of an age to learn gymnastics.

Very true.

That was my meaning when I said that we must te"ach
music before gymnastics.

Quite right, he said.

You know also that the beginning is the most important The begin-
part of any work, especially in the case of a young and tender JJJ"ft^
thing; for that is the time at which the character is being portant
formed and the desired impression is more readily taken. Part of

,_ education.

Quite true.

And shall we just carelessly allow children to hear any
casual tales which may be devised by casual persons, and
to receive into their minds ideas for the most part the
very opposite of those which we should wish them to have
when they are grown up ?

We cannot.

Then the first thing will be to establish a censorship of the Works of
writers of fiction, and let the censors receive any tale of {^acld
fiction which is good, and reject the bad ; and we will desire under a
mothers and nurses to tell their children the authorised ones censorship-
only. Let them fashion the mind with such tales, even more
fondly than they mould the body with their hands; but
most of those which are now in use must be discarded.

60

Homer and Hesiod.

Republic

Homer and

bad lies,
that is to

say, they

give false
representa-

tionsof the

gods,

which have

minds of
youth.

Of what tales are you speaking ? he said.

You may find a model of the lesser in the greater, I said ;
f°r *key are necessarily of the same type, and there is the
same spirit in both of them.

Very likely, he replied ; but I do not as yet know what you
would term the greater.

Those, I said, which are narrated by Homer and Hesiod,

EnC* the FeSt °^ the POets> wno nave ever been tne §reat storv-

tellers of mankind.

gut whicn stories do you mean, he said ; and what fault do

. J

you find with them ?

A fault which is most serious, I said : the fault of telling a

.. . .. ;

*ie> and, what is more, a bad he.

But when is this fault committed ?

Whenever an erroneous representation is made of the
nature of gods and heroes, — as when a painter paints a
portrait not having the shadow of a likeness to the original.

Yes, he said, that sort of thing is certainly very blameable ;
but what are the stories which you mean ?

First of all, I said, there was that greatest of all lies in high
places, which the poet told about Uranus, and which was a
bad lie too, — I mean what Hesiod says that Uranus did, and
how Cronus retaliated on him \ The doings of Cronus, and 378
the sufferings which in turn his son inflicted upon him, even if
they were true, ought certainly not to be lightly told to young
and thoughtless persons ; if possible, they had better be
buried in silence. But if there is an absolute necessity for
their mention, a chosen few might hear them in a mystery,
and they should sacrifice not a common [Eleusinian] pig, but
some huge and unprocurable victim ; and then the number of
the hearers will be very few indeed.

Why, yes, said he, those stories are, extremely objectionable.

Yes, Adeimantus, they are stories not to be repeated in our
State ; the young man should not be told that in committing
the worst of crimes he is far from doing anything outrageous ;
an(j jj^ even if he chastises his father when he does wrong,
in whatever manner, he will only be following the example of
the first and greatest among the gods.

1 Hesiod, Theogony, 154, 459.

The immoralities of mythology. 61

I entirely agree with you, he said; in my opinion those Republic
stories are quite unfit to be repeated. n'

Neither, if we mean our future guardians to regard the habit ^™ES^
of quarrelling among themselves as of all things the basest, T!jB1|0f|Bt
should any word be said to them of the wars in heaven, and of about the
the plots and fightings of the gods against one another, for quarrels of
they are not true. No, we shall never mention the battles of aiuHheir
the giants, or let them be embroidered on garments ; and we evil be-
shall be silent about the innumerable other quarrels of gods t^one*
and heroes with their friends and relatives. If they would another
only believe us we would tell them that quarrelling is unholy, areuntrue-
and that never up to this time has there been any quarrel
between citizens ; this is what old men and old women should
begin by telling children ; and when they grow up, the poets
also should be told to compose for them in a similar spirit *.
But the narrative of Hephaestus binding Here his mother,
or how on another occasion Zeus sent him flying for taking
her part when she was being beaten, and all the battles of the
gods in Homer — these tales must not be admitted into our Andaile-
State, whether they are supposed to have an allegorical f^03^
meaning or not. For a young person cannot judge what is tions of
allegorical and what is literal ; anything that he receives into them are
his mind at that age is likely to become indelible and unalter- stood by
able ; and therefore it is most important that the tales which the youns-
the young first hear should be models of virtuous thoughts.

There you are right, he replied ; but if any one asks where
are such models to be found and of what tales are you
speaking— how shall we answer him ?

379 I said to him, You and I, Adeimantus, at this moment are
not poets, but founders of a State : now the founders of
a State ought to know the general forms in which poets
should cast their tales, and the limits which must be observed
by them, but to make the tales is not their business.

Very true, he said ; but what are these forms of theology
which you mean ?

Something of this kind, I replied: — God is always to be God is to be
represented as he truly is, whatever be the sort of poetry,
epic, lyric or tragic, in which the representation is given. is,

» Right.

1 Placing the comma after ypavvt, and not a

62 The greater forms of theology :

Republic And is he not truly good ? and must he not be represented

7/- as such ?
SOCRATES, Certainly.

ADEIMANTUS. J . .

And no good thing is hurtful ?

No, indeed.

And that which is not hurtful hurts not ?

Certainly not.

And that which hurts not does no evil ?

No.

And can that which does no evil be a cause of evil ?

Impossible.

And the good is advantageous ?

Yes.

And therefore the cause of well-being ?

Yes.

It follows therefore that the good is not the cause of
all things, but of the good only ?

Assuredly.

God, if he Then God, if he be good, is not the author of all things, as

theSauthorS tne manv assert, but he is the cause of a few things only, and

of good not of most things that occur to men. For few are the goods

only' of human life, and many are the evils, and the good is to be

attributed to God alone ; of the evils the causes are to be

sought elsewhere, and not in him.

That appears to me to be most true, he said.

The fie- Then we must not listen to Homer or to any other poet who

is guilty of the folly of saying that two casks

'Lie at the threshold of Zeus, full of lots, one of good, the other
of evil lots V
and that he to whom Zeus gives a mixture of the two

' Sometimes meets with evil fortune, at other times with good ; '
but that he to whom is given the cup of unmingled ill,
' Him wild hunger drives o'er the beauteous earth.'
And again—

* Zeus, who is the dispenser of good and evil to us.'
And if any one asserts that the violation of oaths and treaties,

1 Iliad xxiv. 527.

I. God is good and the author of good: 2. God is true. 63

which was really the work of Pandarus \ was brought about Republic
by Athene and Zeus, or that the strife and contention of the IL
gods was instigated by Themis and Zeus 2, he shall not have
our approval ; neither will we allow our young men to hear
the words of Aeschylus, that

380 « God plants guilt among men when he desires utterly to destroy
a house.'

And if a poet writes of the sufferings of Niobe — the subject
of the tragedy in which these iambic verses occur — or
of the house of Pelops, or of the Trojan war or on any
similar theme, either we must not permit him to say that
these are the works of God, or if they are of God, he must
devise some explanation of them such as we are seeking : he Only that
must say that God did what was just and right, and they fsv|Jf^Ch
were the better for being punished ; but that those who are nature of
punished are miserable, and that God is the author of their Punish~

ment to be

misery — the poet is not to be permitted to say; though he attributed
may say that the wicked are miserable because they require to God-
to be punished, and are benefited by receiving punishment
from God ; but that God being good is the author of evil to
any one is to be strenuously denied, and not to be said or
sung or heard in verse or prose by any one whether old or
young in any well-ordered commonwealth. Such a fiction is
suicidal, ruinous, impious.

I agree with you, he replied, and am ready to give my
assent to the law.

Let this then be one of our rules and principles concerning
the gods, to which our poets and reciters will be expected to
conform, — that God is not the author of all things, but of
good only.

That will do, he said.

And what do you think of a second principle ? Shall I ask
you whether God is a magician, and of a nature to appear
insidiously now in one shape, and now in another — some-
times himself changing and passing into many forms, some-
times deceiving us with the semblance of such transforma-
tions ; or is he one and the same immutably fixed in his own
proper image ?

1 Iliad ii. 69. » Ib. xx.

The Divine nature incapable of change.

Republic
II.

SOCRATES,

ADEIMANTUS.

Things
must be
changed
either by
another or
by them-
selves.

But God
cannot be
changed by
other; and
will not be
changed by
himself.

I cannot answer you, he said, without more thought.

Well, I said ; but if we suppose a change in anything, that
change must be effected either by the thing itself, or by some
other thing ?

Most certainly.

And things which are at their best are also least liable to
be altered or discomposed ; for example, when healthiest and
strongest, the human frame is least liable to be affected by
meats and drinks, and the plant which is in the fullest vigour
also suffers least from winds or the heat of the sun or any
similar causes.

Of course.

And will not the bravest and wisest soul be least confused 381
or deranged by any external influence ?

True.

And the same principle, as I should suppose, applies to
all composite things— furniture, houses, garments: when
good and well made, they are least altered by time and
circumstances.

Very true.

Then everything which is good, whether made by art or
nature, or both, is least liable to suffer change from without ?

True.

But surely God and the things of God are in every way
perfect ?

Of course they are.

Then he can hardly be compelled by external influence to
take many shapes ?

He cannot.

But may he not change and transform himself?

Clearly, he said, that must be the case if he is changed
at all.

And will he then change himself for the better and fairer,
or for the worse and more unsightly ?

If he change at all he can only change for the worse, for we
cannot suppose him to be deficient either in virtue or beauty.

Very true, Adeimantus ; but then, would any one, whether
God or man, desire to make himself worse ?

Impossible.

Then it is impossible that God should ever be willing to

The falsehoods of the poets. 65

change ; being, as is supposed, the fairest and best that is Republic
conceivable, every God remains absolutely and for ever in

his OWn form. SOCRATES,

. . ADEIMANTUS.

That necessarily follows, he said, in my judgment.
Then, I said, my dear friend, let none of the poets tell us
that

' The gods, taking the disguise of strangers from other lands,
walk up and down cities in all sorts of forms * ; '

and let no one slander Proteus and Thetis, neither let any
one, either in tragedy or in any other kind of poetry, in-
troduce Here disguised in the likeness of a priestess asking
an alms

' For the life-giving daughters of Inachus the river of Argos ; '

— let us have no more lies of that sort. Neither must we
have mothers under the influence of the poets scaring
their children with a bad version of these myths — telling
how certain gods, as they say, 'Go about by night in
the likeness of so many strangers and in divers forms;*
but let them take heed lest they make cowards of their
children, and at the same time speak blasphemy against
the gods.

Heaven forbid, he said.

But although the gods are themselves unchangeable, still
by witchcraft and deception they may make us think that
they appear in various forms ?

Perhaps, he replied.

Well, but can you imagine that God will be willing to lie, Nor will he
whether in word or deed, or to put forth a phantom of ^er^_

himself? sentation

382 I cannot say, he replied. of himself.

Do you not know, I said, that the true lie, if such an
expression may be allowed, is hated of gods and men ?

What do you mean ? he said.

I mean that no one is willingly deceived in that which is
the truest and highest part of himself, or about the truest
and highest matters ; there, above all, he is most afraid of a
lie having possession of him.

1 Horn. Od. xvii. 485.
F

66

The lie in the soul.

Republic
II.

SOCRATES,
ADEIMANTUS.

The true
lie is
equally
hated both
by gods
and men ;
the re-
medial or
preventive
lie is com-
paratively
innocent,
but God
can have
no need
of it.

Still, he said, I do not comprehend you.

The reason is, I replied, that you attribute some profound
meaning to my words ; but I am only saying that deception,
or being deceived or uninformed about the highest realities in
the highest part of themselves, which is the soul, and in that
part of them to have and to hold the lie, is what mankind
least like ; — that, I say, is what they utterly detest.

There is nothing more hateful to them.

And, as I was just now remarking, this ignorance in the
soul of him who is deceived may be called the true lie ; for
the lie in words is only a kind of imitation and shadowy
image of a previous affection of the soul, not pure unadul-
terated falsehood. Am I not right ?

Perfectly right.

The true lie is hated not only by the gods, but also by
men?

Yes.

Whereas the lie in words is in certain cases useful and not
hateful ; in dealing with enemies — that would be an instance ;
or again, when those whom we call our friends in a fit of
madness or illusion are going to do some harm, then it is
useful and is a sort of medicine or preventive ; also in the
tales of mythology, of which we were just now speaking —
because we do not know the truth about ancient times, we
make falsehood as much like truth as we can, and so turn
it to account.

Very true, he said.

But can any of these reasons apply to God? Can we
suppose that he is ignorant of antiquity, and therefore has
recourse to invention ?

That would be ridiculous, he said.

Then the lying poet has no place in our idea of God ?

I should say not.

Or perhaps he may tell a lie because he is afraid of
enemies ?

That is inconceivable.

But he may have friends who are senseless or mad ?

But no mad or senseless person can be a friend of God.

Then no motive can be imagined why God should lie ?

None whatever.

God is truth. 67

Then the superhuman and divine is absolutely incapable of Republic
falsehood? 7/*

YPC SOCRATES,

Then is God perfectly simple and true both in word and*
deed * ; he changes not ; he deceives not, either by sign or
word, by dream or waking vision.
383 Your thoughts, he said, are the reflection of my own.

You agree with me then, I said, that this is the second
type or form in which we should write and speak about divine
things. The gods are not magicians who transform them-
selves, neither do they deceive mankind in any way.

I grant that.

Then, although we are admirers of Homer, we do not Away then
admire the lying dream which Zeus sends to Agamemnon ;
neither will we praise the verses of Aeschylus in which Ofthe
Thetis says that Apollo at her nuptials

* Was celebrating in song her fair progeny whose days were to
be long, and to know no sickness. And when he had spoken of
my lot as in all things blessed of heaven he raised a note of
triumph and cheered my soul. And I thought that the word of
Phoebus, being divine and full of prophecy, would not fail. And
now he himself who uttered the strain, he who was present at the
banquet, and who said this— he it is who has slain my son V

These are the kind of sentiments about the gods which
will arouse our anger; and he who utters them shall be
refused a chorus ; neither shall we allow teachers to make
use of them in the instruction of the young, meaning, as we
do, that our guardians, as far as men can be, should be true
worshippers of the gods and like them.

I entirely agree, he said, in these principles, and promise
to make them my laws.

1 Omitting /cora Qavravias. 2 From a lost play.

F 2

BOOK III

Republic

IIL
SOCRATES,

lessons of
mythology.

The de-

oftheworld

below in
Homer.

SUCH then, I said, are our principles of theology— some steph.
tales are to be told, and others are not to be told to our 386
disciples from their youth upwards, if we mean them to
honour faG gO(js ancj ^eir parents, and to value friendship
with one another.

Yes ; and I think that our principles are right, he said.

gut ^ ^Gy are to be courageous, must they not learn other
lessons besides these, and lessons of such a kind as will take
away the fear of death ? Can any man be courageous who
has the fear of death in him ?

Certainly not, he said.

And can he be fearless of death, or will he choose death in
battle rather than defeat and slavery, who believes the world
below to be real and terrible ?

Impossible.

Then we must assume a control over the narrators of this

C^aSS °^ ta^CS ES WC^ &S °VGT ^ others> anc* ^eS t^iem not

simply to revile, but rather to commend the world below,
intimating to them that their descriptions are untrue, and
will do harm to our future warriors.

That will be our duty, he said.

Then, I said, we shall have to obliterate many obnoxious
passages, beginning with the verses,

* I would rather be a serf on the land of a poor and portionless
man than rule over all the dead who have come to nought V

We must also expunge the verse, which tells us how Pluto
feared,

' Lest the mansions grim and squalid which the gods abhor
should be seen both of mortals and immortals V

1 Od. xi. 489.

a II. xx. 64.

The teaching of the poets about Hades. 69

And again : — Republic

' O heavens ! verily in the house of Hades there is soul and
ghostly form but no mind at all 1 ! ' SOCRATES,

ADEIMANTUS*

Again of Tiresias : —

1 [To him even after death did Persephone grant mind,] that he
alone should be wise ; but the other souls are flitting shades V

Again : —

' The soul flying from the limbs had gone to Hades, lamenting
her fate, leaving manhood and youth V

Again : —

387 'And the soul, with shrilling cry, passed like smoke beneath the
earth V

And,—

'As bats in hollow of mystic cavern, whenever any of them has
dropped out of the string and falls from the rock, fly shrilling
and cling to one another, so did they with shrilling cry hold together
as they moved V

And we must beg Homer and the other poets not to be Such tales
angry if we strike out these and similar passages, not because
they are unpoetical, or unattractive to the popular ear, but
because the greater the poetical charm of them, the less are
they meet for the ears of boys and men who are meant to be
free, and who should fear slavery more than death.

Undoubtedly.

Also we shall have to reject all the terrible and appalling
names which describe the world below — Cocytus and Styx,
ghosts under the earth, and sapless shades, and any similar
words of which the very mention causes a shudder to pass
through the inmost soul of him who hears them. I do not
say that these horrible stories may not have a use of some
kind ; but there is a danger that the nerves of our guardians
may be rendered too excitable and effeminate by them.

There is a real danger, he said.

Then we must have no more of them.

True.

Another and a nobler strain must be composed and sung
by us.

1 II. xxiii. 103. 2 Od. x. 495. 3 II. xvi. 856.

4 Ib. xxiii. 100. 5 Od. xxiv. 6.

70 The reform of Mythology.

Republic Clearly.

And shall we proceed to get rid of the weepings and wail-
SOCRATES, • f famous men ?

ADEIMANTUS. °

The eife- They will go with the rest.

minate and But shall we be right in getting rid of them ? Reflect : our

strains of principle is that the good man will not consider death terrible

famous to any other good man who is his comrade.

^etmoreof YeS '> that ls °Ur PrindPle-

the gods, And therefore he will not sorrow for his departed friend as
tetarish though he had suffered anything terrible ?
ed. He will not.

Such an one, as we further maintain, is sufficient for him-
self and his own happiness, and therefore is least in need of
other men.
True, he said.

And for this reason the loss of a son or brother, or the
deprivation of fortune, is to him of all men least terrible.
Assuredly.

And therefore he will be least likely to lament, and will
bear with the greatest equanimity any misfortune of this sort
which may befall him.

Yes, he will feel such a misfortune far less than another.
Then we shall be right in getting rid of the lamentations
of famous men, and making them over to women (and not
even to women who are good for anything), or to men of a 388
baser sort, that those who are being educated by us to be the
defenders of their country may scorn to do the like.

That will be very right.

Such are Then we will once more entreat Homer and the other

rt*AcSs Poets not to depict Achilles1, who is the son of a goddess,

and Priam,' first lying on his side, then on his back, and then on his face ;

then starting up and sailing in a frenzy along the shores of

the barren sea ; now taking the sooty ashes in both his

hands2 and pouring them over his head, or weeping and

wailing in the various modes which Homer has delineated.

Nor should he describe Priam the kinsman of the gods as

praying and beseeching,

* Rolling in the dirt, calling each man loudly by his name3.'
1 II. xxiv. 10. 2 Ib. xviii. 23. 3 Ib. xxii. 414.

The gods weeping and laughing. 71

Still more earnestly will we beg of him at all events not to Republic
introduce the gods lamenting and saying,

' Alas ! my misery ! Alas ! that I bore the bravest to my sorrow V AD?IMANTUS.
But if he must introduce the gods, at any rate let him not andofZeus
dare so completely to misrepresent the greatest of the gods, ^ehddT
as to make him say — the fate of

* O heavens ! with my eyes verily I behold a dear friend of mine sarpedon
chased round and round the city, and my heart is sorrowful V

Or again : —

* Woe is me that I am fated to have Sarpedon, dearest of men to
me, subdued at the hands of Patroclus the son of Menoetius V

For if, my sweet Adeimantus, our youth seriously listen to
such unworthy representations of the gods, instead of laugh-
ing at them as they ought, hardly will any of them deem that
he himself, being but a man, can be dishonoured by similar
actions ; neither will he rebuke any inclination which may
arise in his mind to say and do the like. And instead of
having any shame or self-control, he will be always whining
and lamenting on slight occasions.

Yes, he said, that is most true.

Yes, I replied ; but that surely is what ought not to be, as
the argument has just proved to us; and by that proof we
must abide until it is disproved by a better.

It ought not to be.

Neither ought our guardians to be given to laughter. For Neither are
a fit of laughter which has been indulged to excess almost J^t-cTce"
always produces a violent reaction. encouraged

So I believe. £±,*

Then persons of worth, even if only mortal men, must not pie of the

be represented as overcome by laughter, and still less must

such a representation of the gods be allowed.
389 Still less of the gods, as you say, he replied.

Then we shall not suffer such an expression to be used

about the gods as that of Homer when he describes how

' Inextinguishable laughter arose among the blessed gods, when
they saw Hephaestus bustling about the mansion V

On your views, we must not admit them.
1 II. xviii. 54. 2 Ib. xxii. 168. 8 Ib. xvi. 433. 4 Ib. i. 599.

The privilege of lying confined to the rulers.

Republic
III.

SOCRATES,
ADEIMANTUS.

Our youth
must be
truthful,

and also
temperate.

On my views, if you like to father them on me ; that we
must not admit them is certain.

Again, truth should be highly valued ; if, as we were say-
ing, a lie is useless to the gods, and useful only as a medicine
to men, then the use of such medicines should be restricted
to physicians ; private individuals have no business with
them.

Clearly not, he said.

Then if any one at all is to have the privilege of lying, the
rulers of the State should be the persons ; and they, in their
dealings either with enemies or with their own citizens, may be
allowed to lie for the public good. But nobody else should
meddle with anything of the kind ; and although the rulers
have this privilege, for a private man to lie to them in return
is to be deemed a more heinous fault than for the patient or
the pupil of a gymnasium not to speak the truth about his
own bodily illnesses to the physician or to the trainer, or for
a sailor not to tell the captain what is happening about the
ship and the rest of the crew, and how things are going with
himself or his fellow sailors.

Most true, he said.

If, then, the ruler catches anybody beside himself lying in
the State,

* Any of the craftsmen, whether he be priest or physician or
carpenter V

he will punish him for introducing a practice which is equally
subversive and destructive of ship or State.

Most certainly, he said, if our idea of the State is ever
carried out 2.

In the next place our youth must be temperate ?

Certainly.

Are not the chief elements of temperance, speaking gener-
ally, obedience to commanders and self-control in sensual
pleasures ?

True.

Then we shall approve such language as that of Diomede
in Homer,

* Friend, sit still and obey my word V

1 Od. xvii. 383 sq. 8 Or, 'if his words are accompanied by actions.' 3 II. iv. 41 2.

Some ignoble verses; also a better strain heard. 73

and the verses which follow, Republic

III.

' The Greeks marched breathing prowess \ CRATES

. . . . in silent awe of their leaders2,' ADEIMANTUS.

and other sentiments of the same kind.
We shall.
What of this line,

* O heavy with wine, who hast the eyes of a dog and the heart of
a stag3,'

390 and of the words which follow ? Would you say that these,
or any similar impertinences which private individuals are
supposed to address to their rulers, whether in verse or
prose, are well or ill spoken ?

They are ill spoken.

They may very possibly afford some amusement, but they
do not conduce to temperance. And therefore they are
likely to do harm to our young men — you would agree with
me there ?

Yes.

And then, again, to make the wisest of men say that nothing The praises
in his opinion is more glorious than of eating

and dnnk-
' When the tables are full of bread and meat, and the cup-bearer in£» and the

carries round wine which he draws from the bowl and pours into J

r improper

the cups4;' behaviour

. . ,, . r of Zeus and

is it fit or conducive to temperance for a young man to hear Here, are
such words ? Or the verse not to be

repeated to
4 The saddest of fates is to die and meet destiny from hunger 5 ' ? the young.

What would you say again to the tale of Zeus, who, while
other gods and men were asleep and he the only person
awake, lay devising plans, but forgot them all in a moment '
through his lust, and was so completely overcome at the
sight of Here that he would not even go into the hut, but
wanted to lie with her on the ground, declaring that he had
never been in such a state of rapture before, even when they
first met one another

' Without the knowledge of their parents 6 ; '

1 Od. iii. 8. 2 Ib. iv. 431. 3 Ib. i. 225.

4 Ib. ix. 8. 5 Ib. xii. 342. « II. xiv. 281.

74 Bribery, insolence, lust, and other vices

Republic or that other tale of how Hephaestus, because of similar
goings on, cast a chain around Ares and Aphrodite * ?

Indeed, he said, I am strongly of opinion that they ought

The inde- nOt to near tnat Sort °^ thing.

cent tale of But any deeds of endurance which are done or told by
Aphrodite ^amous men> these they ought to see and hear; as, for
The oppo- example, what is said in the verses,

ofenduf1 * He smote his breast, and thus reproached his heart,

ranee. Endure, my heart; far worse hast thou endured2!'

Certainly, he said.

In the next place, we must not let them be receivers of gifts
or lovers of money.
Certainly not.
Neither must we sing to them of

'Gifts persuading gods, and persuading reverend kings3.'

Condemna- Neither is Phoenix, the tutor of Achilles, to be approved or

Achilles deemed to have given his pupil good counsel when he told

and Phoe- him that he should take the gifts of the Greeks and assist

them 4 ; but that without a gift he should not lay aside his

anger. Neither will we believe or acknowledge Achilles

himself to have been such a lover of money that he took

Agamemnon's gifts, or that when he had received payment

he restored the dead body of Hector, but that without

payment he was unwilling to do so 5.

Undoubtedly, he said, these are not sentiments which can 391
be approved.

Loving Homer as I do6, I hardly like to say that in
attributing these feelings to Achilles, or in believing that
they are truly attributed to him, he is guilty of downright
impiety. As little can I believe the narrative of his insolence
to Apollo, where he says,

'Thou hast wronged me, O far-darter, most abominable of
deities. Verily I would be even with thee, if I had only the
power 7 ; '

or his insubordination to the river-god 8, on whose divinity
he is ready to lay hands ; or his offering to the dead Patroclus

1 Od. viii. 266. 2 Ib. xx. 17.

3 Quoted by Suidas as attributed to Hesiod. 4 II. ix. 515. 5 Ib. xxiv. 175.
6 Cf. infra, x. 595. 7 H. xxii. 15 sq. 8 Ib. xxi. 130, 223 sq.

should have no place among the gods.

75

of his own hair \ which had been previously dedicated to the
other river-god Spercheius, and that he actually performed
this vow ; or that he dragged Hector round the tomb of
Patroclus 2, and slaughtered the captives at the pyre 3 ; of all
this I cannot believe that he was guilty, any more than I can
allow our citizens to believe that he, the wise Cheiron's
pupil, the son of a goddess and of Peleus who was the
gentlest of men and third in descent from Zeus, was so dis-
ordered in his wits as to be at one time the slave of two
seemingly inconsistent passions, meanness, not untainted
by avarice, combined with overweening contempt of gods
and men.

You are quite right, he replied.

And let us equally refuse to believe, or allow to be re-
peated, the tale of Theseus son of Poseidon, or of Peirithous
son of Zeus, going forth as they did to perpetrate a horrid
rape; or of any other hero or son of a god daring to do such
impious and dreadful things as they falsely ascribe to them in
our day : and let us further compel the poets to declare either
that these acts were not done by them, or that they were not
the sons of gods ; — both in the same breath they shall not
be permitted to affirm. We will not have them trying to
persuade our youth that the gods are the authors of evil, and
that heroes are no better than men — sentiments which, as we
were saying, are neither pious nor true, for we have already
proved that evil cannot come from the gods.

Assuredly not.

And further they are likely to have a bad effect on those
who hear them ; for everybody will begin to excuse his own
vices when he is convinced that similar wickednesses are
always being perpetrated by —

' The kindred of the gods, the relatives of Zeus, whose ancestral
altar, the altar of Zeus, is aloft in air on the peak of Ida,'

and who have

' the blood of deities yet flowing in their veins V

And therefore let us put an end to such tales, lest they
392 engender laxity of morals among the young.

1 II. xxiii. 151. 2 Ib. xxii. 394. 3 Ib. xxiii. 175.

* From the Niobe of Aeschylus.

Republic
III.

SOCRATES,
ADEIMANTUS.

The im-
pious be-
haviour of
Achilles to
Apollo and
the river-
gods ; his
cruelty.

The tale of
Theseus
and Peiri-
thous.

The bad
effect of
these my-
thological
tales upon
the young.

76 The styles of poetry.

Republic By all means, he replied.

But now that we are determining what classes of subjects

AOTMANTUS **^ or are not to ^e sPoken of» let us see whether any have
been omitted by us. The manner in which gods and demigods
and heroes and the world below should be treated has been
already laid down.

Very true.

Misstate- And what shall we say about men? That is clearly the
th^oets remaining portion of our subject.
about men. Clearly so.

But we are not in a condition to answer this question
at present, my friend.

Why not ?

Because, if I am not mistaken, we shall have to say that
about men poets and story-tellers are guilty of making the
gravest misstatements when they tell us that wicked men are
often happy, and the good miserable; and that injustice is
profitable when undetected, but that justice is a man's
own loss and another's gain — these things we shall forbid
them to utter, and command them to sing and say the
opposite.

To be sure we shall, he replied.

But if you admit that I am right in this, then I shall
maintain that you have implied the principle for which we
have been all along contending.

I grant the truth of your inference.

That such things are or are not to be said about men is a
question which we cannot determine until we have discovered
what justice is, and how naturally advantageous to the
possessor, whether he seem to be just or not.

Most true, he said.

Enough of the subjects of poetry : let us now speak of the
style; and when this has been considered, both matter and
manner will have been completely treated.

I do not understand what you mean, said Adeimantus.

Then I must make you understand ; and perhaps I may be
more intelligible if I put the matter in this way. You are
aware, I suppose, that all mythology and poetry is a narration
of events, either past, present, or to come ?

Certainly, he replied.

Difference between Epic and Dramatic poetry. 77

And narration may be either simple narration, or imitation, Republic
or a union of the two ?

That again, he said, I do not quite understand.

I fear that I must be a ridiculous teacher when I have Anal sisof
so much difficulty in making myself apprehended. Like a bad the drama-
speaker, therefore, I will not take the whole of the subject, Jj^16™3111
but will break a piece off in illustration of my meaning. You poetry,
know the first lines of the Iliad, in which the poet says that
393 Chryses prayed Agamemnon to release his daughter, and
that Agamemnon flew into a passion with him ; whereupon
Chryses, failing of his object, invoked the anger of the God
against the Achaeans. Now as far as these lines,

'And he prayed all the Greeks, but especially the two sons
of Atreus, the chiefs of the people,'

the poet is speaking in his own person ; he never leads us to
suppose that he is any one else. But in what follows he
takes the person of Chryses, and then he does all that he can
to make us believe that the speaker is not Homer, but the
aged priest himself. And in this double form he has cast the
entire narrative of the events which occurred at Troy and in
Ithaca and throughout the Odyssey.

Yes.

And a narrative it remains both in the speeches which the
poet recites from time to time and in the intermediate
passages ?

Quite true.

But when the poet speaks in the person of another, may we Epic poetry
not say that he assimilates his style to that of the person who, hasan<;ie-

, T . . to mentof

as he informs you, is going to speak ? imitation

Certainly. in the

And this assimiliation of himself to another, either by theTesUs

the use of voice or gesture, is the imitation of the person simple nar-

whose character he assumes ?
Of course.
Then in this case the narrative of the poet may be said

to proceed by way of imitation ?
Very true.
Or, if the poet everywhere appears and never conceals

himself, then again the imitation is dropped, and his poetry

becomes simple narration. However, in order that I may S°

The imitative art.

Republic
III.

SOCRATES,
ADEIMANTUS.

Tragedy
and Come-
dy are
wholly
imitative ;
dithyram-
bic and
some

other kinds
of poetry
are devoid
of imita-
tion. Epic
poetry is a
combina-
tion of the
two.

make my meaning quite clear, and that you may no more say,
' I don't understand/ I will show how the change might
be effected. If Homer had said, ' The priest came, having his
daughter's ransom in his hands, supplicating the Achaeans,
and above all the kings ; ' and then if, instead of speaking in
the person of Chryses, he had continued in his own person,
the words would have been, not imitation, but simple narration.
The passage would have run as follows (I am no poet, and
therefore I drop the metre), ' The priest came and prayed the
gods on behalf of the Greeks that they might capture Troy
and return safely home, but begged that they would give him
back his daughter, and take the ransom which he brought,
and respect the God. Thus he spoke, and the other Greeks
revered the priest and assented. But Agamemnon was
wroth, and bade him depart and not come again, lest the staff
and chaplets of the God should be of no avail to him — the
daughter of Chryses should not be released, he said — she
should grow old with him in Argos. And then he told
him to go away and not to provoke him, if he intended
to get home unscathed. And the old man went away in
fear and silence, and, when he had left the camp, he 394
called upon Apollo by his many names, reminding him
of everything which he had done pleasing to him, whether in
building his temples, or in offering sacrifice, and praying that
his good deeds might be returned to him, and that the
Achaeans might expiate his tears by the arrows of the god/ —
and so on. In this way the whole becomes simple narrative.

I understand, he said.

Or you may suppose the opposite case — that the inter-
mediate passages are omitted, and the dialogue only left.

That also, he said, I understand ; you mean, for example,
as in tragedy.

You have conceived my meaning perfectly ; and if I mistake
not, what you failed to apprehend before is now made clear to
you, that poetry and mythology are, in some cases, wholly
imitative— instances of this are supplied by tragedy and
comedy; there is likewise the opposite style, in which the
poet is the only speaker — of this the dithyramb affords the best
example ; and the combination of both is found in epic, and
in several other styles of poetry. Do I take you with me ?

The feebleness of imitators.

79

Yes, he said ; I see now what you meant.
I will ask you to remember also what I began by saying,
that we had done with the subject and might proceed to

J

the style.

Yes, I remember.

In saying this, I intended to imply that we must come to an
understanding about the mimetic art, — whether the poets,
in narrating their stories, are to be allowed by us to imitate,
and if so, whether in whole or in part, and if the latter, in
what parts ; or should all imitation be prohibited ?

You mean, I suspect, to ask whether tragedy and comedy
shall be admitted into our State ?

Yes, I said ; but there may be more than this in question :
I really do not know as yet, but whither the argument may
blow, thither we go.

And go we will, he said.

Then, Adeimantus, let me ask you whether our guardians
ought to be imitators ; or rather, has not this question been
decided by the rule already laid down that one man can only
do one thing well, and not many; and that if he attempt
many, he will altogether fail of gaining much reputation
in any?

Certainly.

And this is equally true of imitation; no one man can
imitate many things as well as he would imitate a single one ?

He cannot.

395 Then the same person will hardly be able to play a serious
part in life, and at the same time to be an imitator and imitate
many other parts as well; for even when two species of
imitation are nearly allied, the same persons cannot succeed
in both, as, for example, the writers of tragedy and comedy
— did you not just now call them imitations ?

Yes, I did ; and you are right in thinking that the same
persons cannot succeed in both.

Any more than they can be rhapsodists and actors at once ?

True.

Neither are comic and tragic actors the same ; yet all these
things are but imitations.

They are so.

And human nature, Adeimantus, appears to have been

Republic

ni'

SOCRATES,

ADEIMANTUS.

A hint

(cp. infra,
bk- x>)
Our guard-

imitators,
forone

only do one
thing well;

8o

Kepttblic
III.

SOCRATES,
ADEIMANTUS.

he cannot
even imi-
tate many
things.

Imitations
which are
of the de-
grading
sort.

One man should not play many parts.

coined into yet smaller pieces, and to be as incapable of
imitating many things well, as of performing well the actions
of which the imitations are copies.

Quite true, he replied.

If then we adhere to our original notion and bear in mind
that our guardians, setting aside every other business, are to
dedicate themselves wholly to the maintenance of freedom in
the State, making this their craft, and engaging in no work
which does not bear on this end, they ought not to practise
or imitate anything else ; if they imitate at all, they should
imitate from youth upward only those characters which
are suitable to their profession — the courageous, temperate,
holy, free, and the like; but they should not depict or be
skilful at imitating any kind of illiberality or baseness, lest
from imitation they should come to be what they imitate.
Did you never observe how imitations, beginning in early
youth and continuing far into life, at length grow into habits
and become a second nature, affecting body, voice, and
mind?

Yes, certainly, he said.

Then, I said, we will not allow those for whom we profess
a care and of whom we say that they ought to be good men,
to imitate a woman, whether young or old, quarrelling with
her husband, or striving and vaunting against the gods in
conceit of her happiness, or when she is in affliction, or
sorrow, or weeping; and certainly not one who is in sick-
ness, love, or labour.

Very right, he said.

Neither must they represent slaves, male or female, per-
forming the offices of slaves ?

They must not.

And surely not bad men, whether cowards or any others,
who do the reverse of what we have just been prescribing,
who scold or mock or revile one another in drink or out of
drink, or who in any other manner sin against themselves
and their neighbours in word or deed, as the manner of such
is. Neither should they be trained to imitate the action or 396
speech of men or women who are mad or bad ; for madness,
like vice, is to be known but not to be practised or imitated.

Very true, he replied.

The good man will not act a part unworthy of him. 8 1

^Neither may they imitate smiths or other artificers, or Republic
oarsmen, or boatswains, or the like ?

How can they, he said, when they are not allowed to apply
their minds to the callings of any of these ?

Nor may they imitate the neighing of horses, the bellowing
of bulls, the murmur of rivers and roll of the ocean, thunder,
and all that sort of thing ?

Nay, he said, if madness be forbidden, neither may they
copy the behaviour of madmen.

You mean, I said, if I understand you aright, that there is
one sort of narrative style which may be employed by a truly
good man when he has anything to say, and that another sort
will be used by a man of an opposite character and education.

And which are these two sorts ? he asked.

Suppose, I answered, that a just and good man in the imitations
course of a narration conies on some saying or action of J^11^ may
another good man, — I should imagine that he will like to couraged.
personate him, and will not be ashamed of this sort of
imitation : he will be most ready to play the part of the
good man when he is acting firmly and wisely; in a less
degree when he is overtaken by illness or love or drink, or
has met with any other disaster. But when he comes to a
character which is unworthy of him, he will not make a
study of that ; he will disdain such a person, and will assume
his likeness, if at all, for a moment only when he is performing
some good action ; at other times he will be ashamed to play
a part which he has never practised, nor will he like to
fashion and frame himself after the baser models ; he feels
the employment of such an art, unless in jest, to be beneath
him, and his mind revolts at it.

So I should expect, he replied.

Then he will adopt a mode of narration such as we have
illustrated out of Homer, that is to say, his style will be both
imitative and narrative ; but there will be very little of the
former, and a great deal of the latter. Do you agree ?

Certainly, he said ; that is the model which such a speaker
397 must necessarily take.

But there is another sort of character who will narrate imitations
anything, and, the worse he is, the more unscrupulous he will ™hj^h arr^
be ; nothing will be too bad for him : and he will be ready to hibited.

82

Three styles, simple, pantomimic, mixed.

Republic
III.

SOCRATES,
ADEIMANTUS.

Two kinds
of style —
the one
simple, the
other mul-
tiplex.
There
is^lso
a third
which is a
combina-
tion of the
two.

The simple
style alone
is to be
admitted in
the State ;
the attrac-
tions of
the mixed
style are
acknow-
ledged, but
it appears
to be ex-
cluded.

imitate anything, not as a joke, but in right good earnest, and
before a large company. As I was just now saying, he will
attempt to represent the roll of thunder, the noise of wind
and hail, or the creaking of wheels, and pulleys, and the
various sounds of flutes, pipes, trumpets, and all sorts of
instruments : he will bark like a dog, bleat like a sheep, or
crow like a cock ; his entire art will consist in imitation of
voice and gesture, and there will be very little narration.

That, he said, will be his mode of speaking.

These, then, are the two kinds of style ?

Yes.

And you would agree with me in saying that one of them is
simple and has but slight changes ; and if the harmony and
rhythm are also chosen for their simplicity, the result is that
the speaker, if he speaks correctly, is always pretty much the
same in style, and he will keep within the limits of a single
harmony (for the changes are not great), and in like manner
he will make use of nearly the same rhythm?

That is quite true, he said.

Whereas the other requires all sorts of harmonies and all
sorts of rhythms, if the music and the style are to correspond,
because the style has all sorts of changes.

That is also perfectly true, he replied.

And do not the two styles, or the mixture of the two, com-
prehend all poetry, and every form of expression in words ?
No one can say anything except in one or other of them or in
both together.

They include all, he said.

And shall we receive into our State all the three styles, or
one only of the two unmixed styles ? or would you include
the mixed ?

I should prefer only to admit the pure imitator of virtue.

Yes, I said, Adeimantus ; but the mixed style is also very
charming : and indeed the pantomimic, which is the opposite
of the one chosen by you, is the most popular style with
children and their attendants, and with the world in general.

I do not deny it.

But I suppose you would argue that such a style is unsuit-
able to our State, in which human nature is not twofold or
manifold, for one man plays one part only ?

The melody and rhythm are to follow the words. 83

Yes ; quite unsuitable. Republic

And this is the reason why in our State, and in our State 7//*
only, we shall find a shoemaker to be a shoemaker and not SOCRATES,

111 t ADEIMANTUS,

a pilot also, and a husbandman to be a husbandman and not a GLAUCON.
dicast also, and a soldier a soldier and not a trader also, and
the same throughout ?

True, he said.

398 And therefore when any one of these pantomimic gentle- The panto-
men, who are so clever that they can imitate anything, p111™0^51

J °' is to receive

comes to us, and makes a proposal to exhibit himself great
and his poetry, we will fall down and worship him as honours,

... , . c . , . , but he is to

a sweet and holy and wonderful being; but we must be sent out
also inform him that in our State such as he are not of the
permitted to exist; the law will not allow them. And so c
when we have anointed him with myrrh, and set a garland
of wool upon his head, we shall send him away to another
city. For we mean to employ for our souls' health the
rougher and severer poet or story-teller, who will imitate
the style of the virtuous only, and will follow those models
which we prescribed at first when we began the education
of our soldiers.

We certainly will, he said, if we have the power.

Then now, my friend, I said, that part of music or literary
education which relates to the story or myth may be con-
sidered to be finished ; for the matter and manner have both
been discussed.

I think so too, he said.

Next in order will follow melody and song.

That is obvious.

Every one can see already what we ought to say about
them, if we are to be consistent with ourselves.

I fear, said Glaucon, laughing, that the word 'every one'
hardly includes me, for I cannot at the moment say what
they should be ; though I may guess.

At any rate you can tell that a song or ode has three
parts — the words, the melody, and the rhythm ; that degree
of knowledge I may presuppose ?

Yes, he said ; so much as that you may.

And as for the words, there will surely be no difference
between words which are and which are not set to music ;

G 2

The harmonies or modes and their effects.

Republic
III.

SOCRATES,
GLAUCON.

Melody

and

rhythm.

The re-
laxed me-
lodies or
harmonies
are the
Ionian and
the Lydian.
These are
to be
banished.

both will conform to the same laws, and these have been
already determined by us ?

Yes.

And the melody and rhythm will depend upon the words ?

Certainly.

We were saying, when we spoke of the subject-matter,
that we had no need of lamentation and strains of sorrow ?

True.

And which are the harmonies expressive of sorrow ? You
are musical, and can tell me.

The harmonies which you mean are the mixed or tenor
Lydian, and the full-toned or bass Lydian, and such like.

These then, I said, must be banished; even to women
who have a character to maintain they are of no use, and
much less to men.

Certainly.

In the next place, drunkenness and softness and indolence
are utterly unbecoming the character of our guardians.

Utterly unbecoming.

And which are the soft or drinking harmonies ?

The Ionian, he replied, and the Lydian ; they are termed 399
'relaxed.1

Well, and are these of any military use ?

Quite the reverse, he replied ; and if so the Dorian and the
Phrygian are the only ones which you have left.

I answered : Of the harmonies I know nothing, but I want
to have one warlike, to sound the note or accent which
a brave man utters in the hour of danger and stern resolve,
or when his cause is failing, and he is going to wounds
or death or is overtaken by some other evil, and at every
such crisis meets the blows of fortune with firm step and
a determination to endure ; and another to be used by him
in times of peace and freedom of action, when there is no
pressure of necessity, and he is seeking to persuade God by
prayer, or man by instruction and admonition, or on the other
hand, when he is expressing his willingness to yield to
persuasion or entreaty or admonition, and which represents
him when by prudent conduct he has attained his end, not
carried away by his success, but acting moderately and wisely
under the circumstances, and acquiescing in the event. These

Musical instruments ; rhythms. 85

two harmonies I ask you to leave ; the strain of necessity Republic
and the strain of freedom, the strain of the unfortunate and IIL
the strain of the fortunate, the strain of courage, and the SOCRATES,
strain of temperance ; these, I say, leave.

And these, he replied, are the Dorian and Phrygian har-
monies of which I was just now speaking.

Then, I said, if these and these only are to be used in our The Do-
songs and melodies, we shall not want multiplicity of notes ^ a?d

. . * Phrygian

or a panharmonic scale ? are to be

I Suppose not. retained.

Then we shall not maintain the artificers of lyres with
three corners and complex scales, or the makers of any other
many-stringed curiously-harmonised instruments ?

Certainly not.

But what do you say to flute-makers and flute-players? Musical
Would you admit them into our State when you reflect that JU^T_
in this composite use of harmony the flute is worse than which are
all the stringed instruments put together; even the pan- fobe re-
harmonic music is only an imitation of the flute ? which *"

Clearly not. allowed ?

There remain then only the lyre and the harp for use in
the city, and the shepherds may have a pipe in the country.

That is surely the conclusion to be drawn from the
argument.

The preferring of Apollo and his instruments to Marsyas
and his instruments is not at all strange, I said.

Not at all, he replied.

And so, by the dog of Egypt, we have been unconsciously
purging the State, which not long ago we termed luxurious.

And we have done wisely, he replied.

Then let us now finish the purgation, I said. Next in order
to harmonies, rhythms will naturally follow, and they should
be subject to the same rules, for we ought not to seek out
complex systems of metre, or metres of every kind, but rather
to discover what rhythms are the expressions of a courageous
400 and harmonious life ; and when we have found them, we
shall adapt the foot and the melody to words having a like
spirit, not the words to the foot and melody. To say what
these rhythms are will be your duty — you must teach me
them, as you have already taught me the harmonies.

86

The question of rhythms referred to Damon.

Republic
IIL

SOCRATES,
GLAUCON.

Three
kinds of
rhythm as
there are
four notes
of the te-
trachord.

Rhythm
and har-
mony
follow
style, and
style is the
expression
of the soul.

But, indeed, he replied, I cannot tell you. I only know
that there are some three principles of rhythm out of which
metrical systems are framed, just as in sounds there are four
notes * out of which all the harmonies are composed ; that is
an observation which I have made. But of what sort of lives
they are severally the imitations I am unable to say.

Then, I said, we must take Damon into our counsels ; and
he will tell us what rhythms are expressive of meanness,
or insolence, or fury, or other unworthiness, and what are to
be reserved for the expression of opposite feelings. And
I think that I have an indistinct recollection of his men-
tioning a complex Cretic rhythm; also a dactylic or heroic,
and he arranged them in some manner which I do not quite
understand, making the rhythms equal in the rise and fall of
the foot, long and short alternating; and, unless I am mistaken,
he spoke of an iambic as well as of a trochaic rhythm, and
assigned to them short and long quantities 2. Also in some
cases he appeared to praise or censure the movement of the
foot quite as much as the rhythm ; or perhaps a combination
of the two ; for I am not certain what he meant. These
matters, however, as I was saying, had better be referred
to Damon himself, for the analysis of the subject would
be difficult, you know ?

Rather so, I should say.

But there is no difficulty in seeing that grace or the
absence of grace is an effect of good or bad rhythm.

None at all.

And also that good and bad rhythm naturally assimilate to
a good and bad style ; and that harmony and discord in like
manner follow style; for our principle is that rhythm and
harmony are regulated by the words, and not the words
by them.

Just so, he said, they should follow the words.

And will not the words and the character of the style
depend on the temper of the soul ?

1 i. e. the fonr notes of the tetrachord.

a Socrates expresses himself carelessly in accordance with his assumed igno-
rance of the details of the subject. In the first part of the sentence he appears
to be speaking of paeonic rhythms which are in the ratio of f ; in the second part,
of dactylic and anapaestic rhythms, which are in the ratio of \ ; in the last
clause, of iambic and trochaic rhythms, which are in the ratio of \ or f .

Other artists, and not only poets, to be under the State. 8 7

Yes. Republic

And everything else on the style ? IIL

Yes. SOCRATES,

Then beauty of style and harmony and grace and good

, . ,. . , J . - Simplicity

rhythm depend on simplicity, — 1 mean the true simplicity of the great
a rightly and nobly ordered mind and character, not that first prin-
other simplicity which is only an euphemism for folly ?

Very true, he replied.

And if our youth are to do their work in life, must they not
make these graces and harmonies their perpetual aim ?

They must.

401 And surely the art of the painter and every other creative andaprm-
and constructive art are full of them, — weaving, embroidery, ^I^defnch
architecture, and every kind of manufacture; also nature, spread in
animal and vegetable, — in all of them there is grace or the nature and
absence of grace. And ugliness and discord and inhar-
monious motion are nearly allied to ill words and ill nature,
as grace and harmony are the twin sisters of goodness and
virtue and bear their likeness.

That is quite true, he said.

But shall our superintendence go no further, and are the Our titi-
poets only to be required by us to express the image of the Z6o^™ustto
good in their works, on pain, if they do anything else, of manhood
expulsion from our State ? Or is the same control to be ex- amidst
tended to other artists, and are they also to be prohibited from Sions of
exhibiting the opposite forms of vice and intemperance and grace and
meanness and indecency in sculpture and building and the Oniy ^ail
other creative arts ; and is he who cannot conform to this rule ugliness
of ours to be prevented from practising his art in our State, J^™
lest the taste of our citizens be corrupted by him? We excluded.
would not have our guardians grow up amid images of moral
deformity, as in some noxious pasture, and there browse and
feed upon many a baneful herb and flower day by day,
little by little, until they silently gather a festering mass of
corruption in their own soul. Let our artists rather be those
who are gifted to discern the true nature of the beautiful and
graceful ; then will our youth dwell in a land of health, amid
fair sights and sounds, and receive the good in everything ;
and beauty, the effluence of fair works, shall flow into the eye
and ear, like a health-giving breeze from a purer region, and

Music the most potent instrument of education.

Republic
III.

SOCRATES,
GLAUCON.

The power
of impart-
ing grace is

by har-
mony.

The true
musician
must know
the essen-
tial forms
of virtue
and vice.

insensibly draw the soul from earliest years into likeness and
sympathy with the beauty of reason.

There can be no nobler training than that, he replied.

And therefore, I said, Glaucon, musical training is a more
potent instrument than any other, because rhythm and har-
mony find their way into the inward places of the soul, on
which they mightily fasten, imparting grace, and making the
soul of him who is rightly educated graceful, or of him who
is ill-educated ungraceful ; and also because he who has
received this true education of the inner being will most
shrewdly perceive omissions or faults in art and nature,
and with a true taste, while he praises and rejoices over and 402
receives into his soul the good, and becomes noble and good,
he will justly blame and hate the bad, now in the days of his
youth, even before he is able to know the reason why ; and
when reason comes he will recognise and salute the friend
with whom his education has made him long familiar.

Yes, he said, I quite agree with you in thinking that our
youth should be trained in music and on the grounds which
you mention.

Just as in learning to read, I said, we were satisfied when
we knew the letters of the alphabet, which are very few, in
all their recurring sizes and combinations ; not slighting
them as unimportant whether they occupy a space large or
small, but everywhere eager to make them out; and not
thinking ourselves perfect in the art of reading until we
recognise them wherever they are found l :

True —

Or, as we recognise the reflection of letters in the water,
or in a mirror, only when we know the letters themselves ;
the same art and study giving us the knowledge of both :

Exactly —

Even so, as I maintain, neither we nor our guardians,
whom we have to educate, can ever become musical until we
and they know the essential forms of temperance, courage,
liberality, magnificence, and their kindred, as well as the
contrary forms, in all their combinations, and can recognise
them and their images wherever they are found, not slighting

1 Cp. supra, II. 368 D.

' Mem pulchra in corpore pulchro! 89

them either in small things or great, but believing them all Republic
to be within the sphere of one art and study.

Most assuredly.

And when a beautiful soul harmonizes with a beautiful _,

The har-

form, and the two are cast in one mould, that will be the monyof
fairest of sights to him who has an eye to see it ? soul and

J body the

The fairest indeed. fairest of

And the fairest is also the loveliest ? sights.

That may be assumed.

And the man who has the spirit of harmony will be most
in love with the loveliest ; but he will not love him who is of
an inharmonious soul ?

That is true, he replied, if the deficiency be in his soul ; The true
but if there be any merely bodily defect in another he will J^^d
be patient of it, and will love all the same. defects of

I perceive, I said, that you have or have had experiences the P61"5011-
of this sort, and I agree. But let me ask you another ques-
tion : Has excess of pleasure any affinity to temperance ?

How can that be ? he replied ; pleasure deprives a man of
the use of his faculties quite as much as pain.

Or any affinity to virtue in general ?
403 None whatever.

Any affinity to wantonness and intemperance ?

Yes, the greatest.

And is there any greater or keener pleasure than that of
sensual love ?

No, nor a madder.

Whereas true love is a love of beauty and order — tern- True love is
perate and harmonious ?

Quite true, he said.

Then no intemperance or madness should be allowed to
approach true love ?

Certainly not.

Then mad or intemperate pleasure must never be allowed True love is
to come near the lover and his beloved ; neither of them can ^suaiit1
have any part in it if their love is of the right sort ? and coarse-

No, indeed, Socrates, it must never come near them. ness>

Then I suppose that in the city which we are founding you
would make a law to the effect that a friend should use no
other familiarity to his love than a father would use to his

QO

The good soul improves the body, not the body the soul.

Republic
'

Gymnastic.

The body

trustedto
the mind,

The usual

training of

sleepy.

son, and then only for a noble purpose, and he must first
have the other's consent ; and this rule is to limit him in
a11 his intercourse, and he is never to be seen going further,
or, if he exceeds, he is to be deemed guilty of coarseness and
bad taste.

I quite agree, he said.

Thus much of music, which makes a fair ending ; for what
should be the end of music if not the love of beauty ?

I agree, he said.

After music comes gymnastic, in which our youth are next
to be trained.

Certainly.

Gymnastic as well as music should begin in early years ; the
training in it should be careful and should continue through
life. Now my belief is, — and this is a matter upon which
I should like to have your opinion in confirmation of my own,
but my own belief is, — not that the good body by any bodily
excellence improves the soul, but, on the contrary, that the
good soul, by her own excellence, improves the body as
far as this may be possible. What do you say ?

Yes, I agree.

Then, to the mind when adequately trained, we shall be
right; in handing over the more particular care of the body ;
and in order to avoid prolixity we will now only give the
general outlines of the subject.

Very good.

That they must abstain from intoxication has been already
remarked by us ; for of all persons a guardian should be the
last to get drunk and not know where in the world he is.

Yes, he said ; that a guardian should require another
guardian to take care of him is ridiculous indeed.

But next, what shall we say of their food ; for the men are
in training for the great contest of all — are they not ?

Yes, he said.

And will the habit of body of our ordinary athletes be 404
suited to them ?

Why not ?

I am afraid, I said, that a habit of body such as they have
is but a sleePy sort of thin& and rather perilous to health.
Do you not observe that these athletes sleep away their

The simple gymnastic twin sister of the simple music. 9 1

lives, and are liable to most dangerous illnesses if they Republic
depart, in ever so slight a degree, from their customary 7//<

regimen ? SOCRATES,

° GLAUCON.

Yes, I do.

Then, I said, a finer sort of training will be required for
our warrior athletes, who are to be like wakeful dogs, and
to see and hear with the utmost keenness ; amid the many
changes of water and also of food, of summer heat and
winter cold, which they will have to endure when on a
campaign, they must not be liable to break down in health.

That is my view.

The really excellent gymnastic is twin sister of that simple
music which we were just now describing.

How so ?

Why, I conceive that there is a gymnastic which, like our Military
music, is simple and good ; and especially the military gym- &ymnastlc-
nastic.

What do you mean ?

My meaning may be learned from Homer ; he, you know,
feeds his heroes at their feasts, when they are campaigning,
on soldiers' fare; they have no fish, although they are on
the shores of the Hellespont, and they are not allowed
boiled meats but only roast, which is the food most con-
venient for soldiers, requiring only that they should light
a fire, and not involving the trouble of carrying about pots
and pans.

True.

And I can hardly be mistaken in saying that sweet sauces
are nowhere mentioned in Homer. In proscribing them,
however, he is not singular; all professional athletes are
well aware that a man who is to be in good condition should
take nothing of the kind.

Yes, he said ; and knowing this, they are quite right in not
taking them.

Then you would not approve of Syracusan dinners, and Syracusan
the refinements of Sicilian cookery ? SrinthSf

I think not. courtezans

Nor, if a man is to be in condition, would you allow him to
have a Corinthian girl as his fair friend ?
Certainly not.

The vanity of doctors and lawyers.

Republic
III.

SOCRATES,
GLAUCON.

The luxuri-
ous style of
living may
be justly
compared
to the pan-
harmonic
strain of
music.

Every man
should be
his own
doctor and
lawyer.

Bad as it is
to go to
law, it is
still worse
to be a
lover of
litigation.

Neither would you approve of the delicacies, as they are
thought, of Athenian confectionary?

Certainly not.

All such feeding and living may be rightly compared by
us to melody and song composed in the panharmonic style,
and in all the rhythms.

Exactly.

There complexity engendered licence, and here disease;
whereas simplicity in music was the parent of temperance in
the soul ; and simplicity in gymnastic of health in the body.

Most true, he said.

But when intemperance and diseases multiply in a State, 405
halls of justice and medicine are always being opened ; and
the arts of the doctor and the lawyer give themselves airs,
finding how keen is the interest which not only the slaves
but the freemen of a city take about them.

Of course.

And yet what greater proof can there be of a bad and dis-
graceful state of education than this, that not only artisans
and the meaner sort of people need the skill of first-rate phy-
sicians and judges, but also those who would profess to have
had a liberal education ? Is it not disgraceful, and a great
sign of the want of good-breeding, that a man should have to
go abroad for his law and physic because he has none of his
own at home, and must therefore surrender himself into the
hands of other men whom he makes lords and judges over
him?

Of all things, he said, the most disgraceful.

Would you say ' most,' I replied, when you consider that
there is a further stage of the evil in which a man is not only
a life-long litigant, passing all his days in the courts, either
as plaintiff or defendant, but is actually led by his bad taste
to pride himself on his litigiousness ; he imagines that he is
a master in dishonesty; able to take every crooked turn, and
wriggle into and out of every hole, bending like a withy and
getting out of the way of justice : and all for what ? — in
order to gain small points not worth mentioning, he not
knowing that so to order his life as to be able to do without
a napping judge is a far higher and nobler sort of thing. Is
not that still more disgraceful ?

Asclepius and Her odious. 93

Yes, he said, that is still more disgraceful. Republic

Well, I said, and to require the help of medicine, not when /7/'

a wound has to be cured, or on occasion of an epidemic, but

just because, by indolence and a habit of life such as we have

been describing, men fill themselves with waters and winds, require the

as if their bodies were a marsh, compelling the ingenious helP°f

f A i r» i c I- i medicine.

sons of Asclepius to find more names for diseases, such as
flatulence and catarrh ; is not this, too, a disgrace ?

Yes, he said, they do certainly give very strange and new-
fangled names to diseases.

Yes, I said, and I do not believe that there were any such in the time
diseases in the days of Asclepius; and this I infer from the pj^^of
circumstance that the hero Eurypylus, after he has been Homer the
wounded in Homer, drinks a posset of Pramnian wine well J^icine°f
406 besprinkled with barley-meal and grated cheese, which are was very
certainly inflammatory, and yet the sons of Asclepius who were simPle-
at the Trojan war do not blame the damsel who gives him
the drink, or rebuke Patroclus, who is treating his case.

Well, he said, that was surely an extraordinary drink to be
given to a person in his condition.

Not so extraordinary, I replied, if you bear in mind that The nurs-
in former days, as is commonly said, before the time of ^JiLfan
Herodicus, the guild of Asclepius did not practise our pre- with He-
sent system of medicine, which may be said to educate rodicus-
diseases. But Herodicus, being a trainer, and himself of a
sickly constitution, by a combination of training and doctor-
ing found out a way of torturing first and chiefly himself,
and secondly the rest of the world.

How was that ? he said.

By the invention of lingering death ; for he had a mortal
disease which he perpetually tended, and as recovery was out
of the question, he passed his entire life as a valetudinarian ;
he could do nothing but attend upon himself, and he was
in constant torment whenever he departed in anything from
his usual regimen, and so dying hard, by the help of science
he struggled on to old age.

A rare reward of his skill !

Yes, I said ; a reward which a man might fairly expect
who never understood that, if Asclepius did not instruct his
descendants in valetudinarian arts, the omission arose, not

94

The saying of Phocy tides.

Republic
IIL

SOCRATES,
GLAUCON.

The work-
ing-man
has no time
for tedious
remedies.

The slow
cure

equally an
impedi-
ment to the
mechanical
arts, to the
practice of
virtue,

from ignorance or inexperience of such a branch of medicine,
but because he knew that in all well-ordered states every
individual has an occupation to which he must attend, and
has therefore no leisure to spend in continually being ill.
This we remark in the case of the artisan, but, ludicrously
enough, do not apply the same rule to people of the richer
sort.

How do you mean ? he said.

I mean this : When a carpenter is ill he asks the physician
for a rough and ready cure ; an emetic or a purge or a cautery
or the knife, — these are his remedies. And if some one pre-
scribes for him a course of dietetics, and tells him that he
must swathe and swaddle his head, and all that sort of thing,
he replies at once that he has no time to be ill, and that he sees
no good in a life which is spent in nursing his disease to the
neglect of his customary employment ; and therefore bidding
good-bye to this sort of physician, he resumes his ordinary
habits, and either gets well and lives and does his business,
or, if his constitution fails, he dies and has no more trouble.

Yes, he said, and a man in his condition of life ought to
use the art of medicine thus far only.

Has he not, I said, an occupation ; and what profit would 407
there be in his life if he were deprived of his occupation ?

Quite true, he said.

But with the rich man this is otherwise ; of him we do not
say that he has any specially appointed work which he must
perform, if he would live.

He is generally supposed to have nothing to do.

Then you never heard of the saying of Phocylides, that as
soon as a man has a livelihood he should practise virtue ?

Nay, he said, I think that he had better begin somewhat
sooner.

Let us not have a dispute with him about this, I said ; but
rather ask ourselves : Is the practice of virtue obligatory on
the rich man, or can he live without it ? And if obligatory
on him, then let us raise a further question, whether this
dieting of disorders, which is an impediment to the ap-
plication of the mind in carpentering and the mechanical
arts, does not equally stand in the way of the sentiment
of Phocylides ?

Asclepius a statesman. 95

Of that, he replied, there can be no doubt ; such excessive Republic
care of the body, when carried beyond the rules of gymnastic, ///>
is most inimical to the practice of virtue. SOCRATES,

1 Yes, indeed, I replied, and equally incompatible with the and an
management of a house, an army, or an office of state ; and, kind of
what is most important of all, irreconcileable with any kind Stud7 or
of study or thought or self-reflection — there is a constant
suspicion that headache and giddiness are to be ascribed to
philosophy, and hence all practising or making trial of virtue
in the higher sense is absolutely stopped; for a man is
always fancying that he is being made ill, and is in constant
anxiety about the state of his body.

Yes, likely enough.

And therefore our politic Asclepius may be supposed to Asclepius
have exhibited the power of his art only to persons who, ^fdis-0t
being generally of healthy constitution and habits of life, had eased con-
a definite ailment ; such as these he cured by purges and j^^g s
operations, and bade them live as usual, herein consulting they were
the interests of the State; but bodies which disease had
penetrated through and through he would not have at-
tempted to cure by gradual processes of evacuation and in-
fusion : he did not want to lengthen out good-for-nothing
lives, or to have weak fathers begetting weaker sons ; — if a
man was not able to live in the ordinary way he had no
business to cure him ; for such a cure would have been of
no use either to himself, or to the State.

Then, he said, you regard Asclepius as a statesman.

Clear